Conference changes

[FCGrizzliesGrad]

Being an NCAA Provisional team, they are not yet eligible for the NCAA Tournament. In these situations, most leagues award the AQ to the tournament runner-up if they win. So a team might enter a final vs. Brandywine knowing they've won the AQ already.

If I recall, this happened in the SCAC when St. Thomas TX was a provisional.

Yes, I recall those. I did not ask this properly. Why would a conference want a provisional team participating in post-season play?  Or is it a case of they have to?  Or is it in conference bylaws, and changes from conf to conf?

If they're a full conference member, paying full conference dues, they probably have a right to participate.  With the new regulations requiring conference sponsorship for new D3 members, I think they're forced to a more concrete relationship than existed in the past. Previously you could say, "yes, we'll let you in once you're eligible."  Now, the NCAA requires some greater guarantee.

I think that's a guess and not real. Carlow, for example, was not eligible for the AMCC tournament last year.  It is up to every conference to determine how they want to do it, and if a conference decides that it's beneficial to have its transitional/provisional D-III members participate, it can do so. Or it can choose not to. Those who do might well see it as an incentive for those schools to join in the first place, if they are hard up for members, or if there's a school they really want to join.

Carlow's also not eligible this year (right?  their WBB team finished 6th but isn't in the conference tournament).  Presumably that was the deal they worked out when they joined.  I'm just saying, the NCAA does require a conference sponsorship now, which some schools may parlay into full participation sooner than they might have been able to do previously.

It likely just comes down to which party has more leverage in the negotiation for membership.

Seems that way. The Carlow men finished 7th but would have taken the last spot due to Pitt-Bradford's penalty. Instead the 6th seed went to Alfred St who finished 8th.