Yeah, I figured that.  But one can always be Pollyanna!!!!

The door is open for at least a co-championship IF (I know a big if) W&J beats Westminster and we then run the table.

Longshot to be sure, but one can always dream!

Ah.  I guess that means that their win over CWRU wasn't a quality win.

OUCH!!!

 

Okay, so perhaps W&J.  If, by chance, we were to run the table the rest of the way in conference, do you think we'd have a chance at being champ or co-champ?  I know it's a longshot, and I know other teams will have to beat each other/lose to each other, but I was wondering what you think our chances might be.

Gee.

No conversations about this week's results?

Based on what people can see, does Westminster appear to be this year's front runner until further notice?

Consider the gauntlet that the #4 ranked and undefeated CWRU Spartans will soon face.

After Baldwin-Wallace on September 30th, this is their UAA schedule:

10/4: #15 Rochester
10/11: #5 Wash U-St. Louis
10/18: #8 Chicago
10/24: #11 Brandeis
10/26: N/R NYU
11/1: #2 Emory
11/8: #20 Carnegie-Mellon

I would say that the winner of this conference should be the odds on favorite to win it all!

Good to get win #1 over Bethany.

55-0.

Ah, I see.

Unfortunate.

Well, hopefully we get win number one this week.

As for the future of D3, stop panicking.

A few schools may collapse, and a small number will be very negatively affected.

Fearless prediction: it won't significantly affect the future of D3 as a whole.

Quote from: CNU85 on September 25, 2025, 09:53:16 AMDemographic report

Here is some information from a study/report published December 2024. The only thing I could not readily find is any hard figures on the trend of high school graduates who enroll in college. Perhaps it is in the report. I just couldn't find it. I will look at the reference figure indicated and see if I can find something.

"News reports and policy briefs routinely refer to the pending decline in the school-age population as "an enrollment cliff."11 While the cliff metaphor is useful to illustrate the impending demographic shift for policymakers, the reality will be a slower and steadier decline, which has important implications for institutions of higher education, workforce training systems, and state and federal policymakers."

"Postsecondary enrollment has been dropping for several years, even as the number of high school graduates has been increasing.74 If higher education collectively cannot ensure its relevancy, demonstrate its value to students, and improve student outcomes like retention and completion, these demographic trends will exacerbate the existing enrollment trends, leading to substantial drops in the number of students, increased workforce shortages, and fundamental financial difficulties for many tuition-dependent institutions."

I think that that is correct.

This "the sky is falling" demographic cliff that people here are talking about that is supposedly coming this year or next year is not correct.

Quote from: WUPHF on September 24, 2025, 06:21:28 PM

Quote from: DagarmanSpartan on September 24, 2025, 04:01:49 PMBut it only has about 6,500 undergrads, which is certainly small in the grand scheme of things.

If you are going for the grand scheme of things, you have to look at overall enrollment.  In terms of resources and reputation, the University looks very different without a major medical school, law school and so on...

Still not large even when considering that.

12k is pretty small for an R1 research university.

See Illinois and Houston (both R1 schools with medicine, law, etc) for reference.

But it only has about 6,500 undergrads, which is certainly small in the grand scheme of things.

Illinois and Houston are big.

Both have several times the number of undergrads, and three or more times the number of total students.

Not sure the facts are even generally agreed upon.

Some say a big "cliff" is coming up next year.....

Others say enrollment has declined since 2010 (which is NOT a cliff).

So you see, even my opponents can't agree on the facts.

Again, any cliff, assuming just for argument's sake that it actually exists and is coming up next year, will only affect a small number of very small and financially insecure schools.

It's not a crisis likely to affect most of D3.

Quote from: Ryan Scott (Hoops Fan) on September 24, 2025, 01:22:53 PMWhy are people engaging in this?  It's a fact.

College enrollment peaked in 2010 at just over 21m.  It's been gradually decreasing since then.  There are fewer children now than there were before - a full 15% drop if you go all the way back to Kindergarten.

If you add fewer 18 year olds to declining college enrollment you get massive enrollment declines.

Add to that the extra burdens currently being placed on foreign enrollments, it gets worse.

It's going to eat up a ton of small and poor colleges over the next decade.

Maybe the raw numbers won't change at rich, prestigious schools or large state institutions, but it's going to impact what it means to attend them or run them.

To say "there's no enrollment cliff" is like saying "the world is flat."  People might do it, but they should be ignored as if they don't exist.

If college enrollment has been dropping since 2010, then its NOT a "cliff."

It's a steady decline; a "slow roll downhill" and NOT a "cliff."  But whatever.  People here are saying that some "cliff' is going to hit this year or next year.............NOT for the past 15 years; your theory is completely different from what has been posted here.

A "cliff" implies that either this year, next year, or at some point very soon, we'll see a big, sudden, and steep drop off in enrollment.  That's what a "cliff" is.

Didn't happen this year...........and if the cliff is next year, as some here now suggest, then we should see some massive effect next year.  My guess is that we won't though, or at least, not for MOST schools.

Again, you might see a few small, poor schools that get significantly affected by this, but that's it.

It's not a big crisis that's going to affect all or even most of D3. 

People need to stop acting like the sky is falling.  IT AIN'T!!!

I have six alma maters, two of which are D3.  So far, NONE of them have seen a drop off in enrollment, and three of the six (including one of my D3 alma maters) have seen RECORD enrollment. 

I feel pretty safe in predicting that we won't see a big drop off in enrollment for any of those three.

Fearless prediction: won't have any significant effect next year either.

STAY TUNED!!!!

My guess is that only the VERY SMALLEST and LEAST STABLE schools will really feel any effects here.

CWRU isn't a large school (6500 or so undergrads), and even it wasn't affected, apparently.

Quote from: Pat Coleman on August 27, 2025, 04:29:52 PM... no cliff for Case Western Reserve does not mean no cliff, still.

Not to belabor the point, but two of my other alma layers, Illinois and Houston, also recently announced record enrollments, with Illinois over 60,000 and Houston over 49,000.

No demographic cliffs there either.