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Post by purplehaze on Jun 25, 2021 14:37:36 GMT -5
For all the nice talk coming out of the mouths of ADMB and others about our pursuit of excellence in our athletic program, let's face the facts - other than football, things are pretty bad on the hill and there's plenty of work to be done. What exactly is the plan to compete (not necessarily win) at the top of the league in so many sports? Here is the latest President's Cup overall standings for the completed athletic season - yes, I know we're 9th (of 10) but we sponsor '9 more sports' than 10th place AU does - for me, that's a dead last finish patriotleague.org/news/2021/6/24/general-navy-captures-seventh-consecutive-patriot-league-presidents-cup-title.aspx |
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Post by sader1970 on Jun 25, 2021 15:25:13 GMT -5
While I really only invest my level of caring in football, basketball (men & women), and a little in baseball and soccer, considering the facilities and how much go and went into these, when will there be a return on investment? And who's accountable? McFarland/Pine? Boroughs/Blossom? The BoT? Individual head coaches?
If this was a business, people would be fired with these kinds of results. Sustained lack of success, year after year.
P.S. Drop the dopey Turnpike Trophy. It's the most uneven playing field there is.
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ignatius
Crusader Century Club
Posts: 122
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Post by ignatius on Jun 25, 2021 16:19:57 GMT -5
Thankfully, Anne is on her way out. I don’t necessarily think the admissions office is the only barrier to PL prominence, but she has been a massive problem for many of those who coach on the Hill. I personally worked for AMcD for two summers and experienced first-hand her disdain for the athletes and prospective athletes at HC. She has single-handledly set us back in so many ways.
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Post by longsuffering on Jun 25, 2021 17:20:36 GMT -5
The Worcester Telegram used to run a ranking of the Worcester area colleges based on overall winning percentage also. Often (always as I remember but didn't really study it) HC was last.
Kind of like the old Washington Senators
"First in War, First in Peace, but last in the American League"
HC is first in everything except wins, in my book.
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Post by sader1970 on Jun 25, 2021 19:38:45 GMT -5
Not to defend Ann McD but as I've posted many time in the past, I've had direct conversations with Frank Vellaccio when he told me that no athlete gets to come to HC without his direct OK. That was when he was senior VP which he obviously no longer is.
That said, there were multiple times at a men's basketball game when he expressed incredulity that a player was on the team (i.e. the quality of play was sub-standard).
My point is that the issue or cause for this lack of athletic success may well be more complicated than one admission director.
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Post by matunuck on Jun 25, 2021 20:11:26 GMT -5
It’s not like she hit it out of the park with regular admissions either. We’ve been stagnating for quite a while.
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Post by newfieguy74 on Jun 25, 2021 20:38:27 GMT -5
This has all been discussed before but it would be interesting to take the winning percentage of every HC sports team over the last 20 years. My guess is that the combined winning percentage would be about 37% (a total guess). We have an amazing school and great facilities but we are a selective, Catholic, small, New England college that evidently doesn't pay its coaches well. Given the challenges what is the path to sustained success across our sports? I don't see one.
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Post by bfoley82 on Jun 25, 2021 21:21:20 GMT -5
This has all been discussed before but it would be interesting to take the winning percentage of every HC sports team over the last 20 years. My guess is that the combined winning percentage would be about 37% (a total guess). We have an amazing school and great facilities but we are a selective, Catholic, small, New England college that evidently doesn't pay its coaches well. Given the challenges what is the path to sustained success across our sports? I don't see one. "Great" facilities is a big reach. |
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Post by nycrusader2010 on Jun 26, 2021 7:27:01 GMT -5
This is nothing new. If you look at the Presidents' Cup standings dating back to the dawn of the PL, we probably are last or second to last just about every year.
Holy Cross sponsors every sport that the Patriot League offers yet we went a stretch of nearly six years at one point without winning even ONE team Patriot League Championship. In between the football team winning in November 2009 and the Carmody "9 seed" five-games-in-March Men's Basketball run in March 2015, we won a total of zero league titles.
One of the best years HC has ever had was my freshman year 2006-2007.
Men's Basketball, Women's Basketball & Women's Lacrosse all won titles. Matt Czarnacki also won the individual Patriot League golf championship. Football finished 2nd due to a one-point heartbreaking loss to Colgate on the last day of the season. Field Hockey lost in the Patriot League Championship game as well. And while the Minnesota game was the prior academic year, that game also happened in 2006 so our Men's Ice Hockey team was skating the 06-07 as defending AHA champs. Oh and how could I forget: the swim team won the Worcester City Championship!!
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Post by sader1970 on Jun 26, 2021 7:31:57 GMT -5
I repeat with emphasis:
"If this was a business, people would be fired with these kinds of results. Sustained lack of success, year after year."
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Post by rgs318 on Jun 26, 2021 7:36:11 GMT -5
Having a post putting HC in last place simply because the poster feels that should be the case, certainly does not help matters. I brought up the President's Cup many years back and was shut down pretty quickly on this forum by being told that "minor sports did not matter, only the major sports of football and basketball"...they even dismissed lax and baseball. Now are we to believe that our place in the President's Cup suddenly is important? Why?
It is nice that HC offers our athletes more sports in which they can participate. How does not having as full a program put AU "ahead" of HC?
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Post by newfieguy74 on Jun 26, 2021 8:25:43 GMT -5
I root for every HC team, all of them. Do I follow some more than others, yes. The lack of success is disappointing but not surprising given the oft-discussed challenges. Firing people is not always the answer. This is not GE or Ford, it's a liberal arts college. Yes, people have to be held accountable. I get the feeling that on the coaching side we only succeed when we find exceptional coaches who can both recruit and coach, and this seems like a heavy lift. Overall, I think ADMB is doing a very good job on all fronts.
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Post by sader1970 on Jun 26, 2021 8:28:12 GMT -5
Rob, we may be mostly in agreement. It's not last place or next to last place in the President's Cup, it's that we are there consistently year after year through one administration after another.
I really don't think a college like Holy Cross can ever win it when you are competing with West Point and Annapolis where the physical conditioning is a way of life for the entire corps and brigade. Competing with BU with an enrollment multiple times bigger is also ridiculous and hence my disdain for the Turnpike Trophy. That slant is as steep as the top of Mt. St. James down to the Blackstone River.
Based on my discussions with administrators over the years, Holy Cross seems to accept the position that offering these "non-revenue" sports like Lax, field hockey, tennis, swimming, etc. attracts students who played these in high school and wish to continue doing so in college. Now, just to rile up some of the youngins here, after all, this is a generation that grew up getting participation trophies so winning is icing on the cake. Vince Lombardi's "Winning isn't everything, it's the only thing" mentality died with him.
Between the alleged NCAA stipend HC gets for sponsoring these varsity sports and the fact that many of these athletes are paying all/much of the cost of an HC education, Holy Cross is likely not going to make major changes. A tweak here or there but don't expect us to be vying for President's Cup leadership in our lifetimes.
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Post by trimster on Jun 26, 2021 8:33:26 GMT -5
This has all been discussed before but it would be interesting to take the winning percentage of every HC sports team over the last 20 years. My guess is that the combined winning percentage would be about 37% (a total guess). We have an amazing school and great facilities but we are a selective, Catholic, small, New England college that evidently doesn't pay its coaches well. Given the challenges what is the path to sustained success across our sports? I don't see one. The fact we are a small, Catholic college located in New England should have little to do with our athletic program’s success or lack thereof. The fact we are selective has something to do with it and if it is true we don’t pay our coaches well, that certainly has something to do with it. As many of us have said here, athletics has been a participatory thing at HC for some time. Athletic success doesn’t appear to be something the administration emphasizes. My guess is many of the faculty are ambivalent at best, in their attitude toward the athletic program. |
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Post by purplehaze on Jun 26, 2021 9:50:19 GMT -5
I focus on how we do against the similar sized, traditional PL schools: Colgate, Bucknell, Lehigh, Lafayette - with similar number of sports and budget. The other schools, in many cases have significant advantages in many (but not all) sports
I am tired of not only losing but being embarrassed on the field of play in many Olympic-minor sports
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Post by newfieguy74 on Jun 26, 2021 10:06:47 GMT -5
I focus on how we do against the similar sized, traditional PL schools: Colgate, Bucknell, Lehigh, Lafayette - with similar number of sports and budget. The other schools, in many cases have significant advantages in many (but not all) sports I am tired of not only losing but being embarrassed on the field of play in many Olympic-minor sports Serious question: what are the advantages these schools have? |
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Post by purplehaze on Jun 26, 2021 10:19:33 GMT -5
I’m referring to the ‘other’ PL schools - Army, Navy are obvious - BU funds many minor sports at near NCAA limits, AU also funds at much higher levels (no football at these schools permits them to do it). I’m not certain of Loyola beyond their full funding of men and women lax
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Post by rgs318 on Jun 26, 2021 10:23:35 GMT -5
Grad schools, with the income they bring to the institution are another advantage.
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Post by longsuffering on Jun 26, 2021 14:19:20 GMT -5
I focus on how we do against the similar sized, traditional PL schools: Colgate, Bucknell, Lehigh, Lafayette - with similar number of sports and budget. The other schools, in many cases have significant advantages in many (but not all) sports I am tired of not only losing but being embarrassed on the field of play in many Olympic-minor sports Serious question: what are the advantages these schools have? When Phreek posts his spending analyses the other schools often fund minor sports higher than HC does. Coaching salaries, which we started to hear about after the football golf tournament are probably a component of that. Other posters feel our Admissions Dept. holds us back. My sense is despite the current AI, the other original PL schools have a longer tradition of using admissions and financial aid to value the contribution of non scholarship athletes similar to the way the Ivy League does. |
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Post by bfoley82 on Jun 26, 2021 17:46:12 GMT -5
I’m referring to the ‘other’ PL schools - Army, Navy are obvious - BU funds many minor sports at near NCAA limits, AU also funds at much higher levels (no football at these schools permits them to do it). I’m not certain of Loyola beyond their full funding of men and women lax Loyola soccer plays in the lax facility which only holds 6k people with their offices. |
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Post by Crucis#1 on Jun 26, 2021 20:29:51 GMT -5
I found this article from 2015 regarding coaching salaries in New England at schools similar to HC. Average 2013-'14 Assistant Coach Salaries At Select N.E. Colleges: www.wbur.org/news/2015/08/11/coaches-salaries-liberal-arts-collegesOf note, HC salaries appeared to be above the salaries of the New England Schools in the survey, the exception to Dartmouth. One would expect, that seven years later, all of the schools have provided a substantial increase to their coaching staffs. The following provides a breakdown of the coaching positions at Bates, Bowdoin and Colby. Granted they are D3 schools, but it provides a salaries of three NESCAC schools, that some in the past stated that HC should emulate. The three schools noted, all have a student athlete population of over 700 participants.The survey is dated, 4-23-21, so it is current. bowdoinorient.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/Money-in-athletics-comparison-copy.pdf |
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Post by hceconhist on Jun 26, 2021 20:40:23 GMT -5
I don't know whether Marcus Blossom will turn it around or not, but this has been the reality at HC for decades now. It can take awhile to reverse such a trend.
There are many reasons for this, and many have been touched on during this thread. A few key factors include admissions, lack of tradition (there is a big and meaningful difference between history and tradition), name identity, and facilities.
There is not much Marcus Blossom can do about name identify and admissions. Although Ann McDermott is leaving (or already has), things will not change unless the BoT wants them changed. Her successor will simply follow suit.
I know the facilities are night-and-day better from my time almost a decade ago, but caveats remain. For one, the basketball facilities are still not the best in the conference - Sojka and the Naval Academy still EASILY beat us. Second, the facilities need to be matched with a change in the culture. I think the athletic department is off to a great start and Marcus Blossom would be wise to deploy all resources possible to keep Chesney as long as he can and build the program up within D1-AA and see if it can yield a domino effect to other sports.
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Post by Crucis#1 on Jun 26, 2021 20:50:51 GMT -5
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Post by mm67 on Jun 26, 2021 20:54:05 GMT -5
RE: Ann. Obviously, admission selectivity is the inverse of the standings in the PLPresidents Cup. HC must have highest admissions standards in the PL. Navy, Army, Colgate, Bucknell and the rest must have lower standards for admission. Irony duly noted.
Or, could there be other reasons for HC's continued abysmal showing?
To be clear, there are factors other than admissions which account for our dismal showing in the Presidents Cup. Our admissions are not the most stringent in the PL. Clearly the military academies, Colgate and possibly Bucknell have higher standards for admission and lower rates of acceptance than HC.
Isn't it time to stop using the admissions office as a punching bag and playing the victim game?
It is heartening to read the comments by most posters exploring other factors which come into play - lack of established minor sports, costs, facilities among others.
HC admissions in comparison to some of the more successful PL programs does not play a significant role.
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Post by hceconhist on Jun 26, 2021 20:56:47 GMT -5
^Based on talks I have had with recent coaches, HC likely does have some of the highest admissions standards in the PL. That said, there are other factors that significantly contribute as well.
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