100% spot on post. Like I said in an earlier post, I coached in the MWC. Athletics is not as important as it is in other conferences.
From my experience, SNC is the one outlier. I would argue on including Ripon in the same sentence as SNC. Don’t think that’s true.
Couple examples on the MWC
*Lake Forest pays $24k to FT football coaches that are non-coordinators (how do you| North Central is 50-60k
*Monmouth has one FT basketball coach... it’s the HC | Majority of D3’s have 3
*Monmouth just recently added a 2nd FT trainer. They have 24 sports. Just simply astounding to me. | Most D3’s will have 5+
*Grinnell has forfeited football games every year do to lack of numbers. Just ridiculous. So many kids out there want to play college football.... go find some.
*Believe most, if not all programs don’t allow graduate assistants. Top D3 programs have 4.
*other than university of Chicago-every school in the conference is struggling w enrollment and I imagine keeping the doors open.
I can buy that athletics in the MWC are not as important as they are in other conferences.
What I can't buy is the implication that every MWC school is struggling with enrollment BECAUSE of athletics. Nor do I buy that every MWC school is struggling with enrollment, period. Athletics in the MWC have not compared well to some D3 conferences for decades. Do you think that perhaps, just perhaps, there are other factors at play regarding shrinking enrollment at some MWC schools? Look at small schools outside the MWC conference that have closed recently. Did poor athletics cause MacMurray to close? St. Joe's? Robert Morris? Holy Family?
What is your source that every school in the conference is struggling with enrollment? The following is a graph of Lawrence University enrollment over the past 20 years. It goes through 2019, when they enrolled 1442 students, but Lawrence is currently reporting 1,472 on their website. Looks pretty steady, wouldn't you agree?
Illinois College reported their highest enrollment ever in 2019 at 1,048 students. Their website is currently reporting 1,000 students. Again, hardly a struggle. Ripon reported 756 students in 2017. Right now, they are reporting 807. Doesn't look like these schools are struggling with enrollment to me.
To be fair, I have read that Beloit, Knox, and Monmouth have experienced declines. But, you said EVERY MWC school with the exception of Chicago.
What I can't buy is that the schools don't care about athletics as another poster has been repeatedly stating. If that is true, then how do you explain Lake Forest College spending like $25 million over the past decade to upgrade their sports facilities? How do you explain them adding lacrosse as a varsity sport? How do you explain SNC spending millions on their gym and adding a pool and and a varsity swimming and men's volleyball program? Other MWC schools have also made investments in their facilities recently.