<p>80,000 screaming fans for football games - UT, (or any Big 12 school), Florida, (or any SEC school), Ohio State, (or most Big 10 schools)</p>
<p>A really hard school to get into, but has really great fans and fun football games is Notre Dame</p>
<p>SBmom, I like your idea of checking out the rankings.</p>
<p>xiggi, it is funny that the student-athlete you read about chose Tulane for its “sports culture.” My son reports that the attendance at the football games is pretty dismal. Of course he compares it the DUCKS selling out (58,000-60,000) every Saturday versus the Green Wave bringing a few thousand to cavernous SuperDome. But, Tulane football has put a number of kids into the NFL lately: Shaun King, Melwede Moore, J. P. Losman, Patrick Ramsey, to name a few. So, despite less than stellar student/city support, they do manage to get some quality football players. And, their baseball team is very highly ranked this year – 5th I believe in the pre-season national rankings.</p>
<p>So, to me, Tulane is something of an enigma. They field some very competitive teams, especially for being a medium size school. Yet, they do not have the fan base – student or local – that they probably deserve. That is why I questioned dstark’s placement of Tulane on his original list.</p>
<p>Speaking for the South - Davidson would be a “Williams clone”, the less competitive part might be relative depending on where you are from, and how well you play - it is D-I for a lot of sports. Vandy of course has loyal fans, although it gets old losing all the time. The SEC + Clemson all have pockets of excellence in their schools, with good honors college opportunities. Univ of Richmond, I don’t know how the students feel, but years ago we lived in Richmond and there were a lot of Spider followers out in the community. Wake Forest is pretty rah-rah, too. Most Southern schools are, sports are just big - as I commented the other day, you should see the turn out for a gymnastics meet at Alabama, or tennis and swimming at Auburn - football is the star, but it is not the only game anymore.</p>
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<p>There are a couple very different versions of this … </p>
<p>Some big schools have big time programs that are on TV, draw big crowds, and compete for national championships … USC, Michigan, (Big 10, Pac 10, SEC), etc … however most of these schools actually have relatively few varsity sports and the students make up a very small % of the students.</p>
<p>A lot of other schools (especially DIII schools) have a much lower tempature to the visibility to their varsity sports (a lot DIII LACs) and they will not be on TV or playing in front go 90,000 people … however, a lot of these schools have many more varsity teams than big schools from the major conferences (almost twice as many) … and since these schools are so much smaller the atheltes actuallymake a much-much bigger % of the population (Williams, Dartmouth, etc).</p>
<p>University of Virginia</p>
<p>3togo, I agree with you.
It is easier to spot USC and Michigan.</p>
<p>So what div 3 schools have close to 40- 50% of their students participating in sports that haven’t been mentioned yet?</p>
<p>I’m looking for more schools like Trinity, and Denison.</p>
<p>Smaller schools mentioned so far include Williams, Amherst (really?), Davidson, Dartmouth, Bowdoin, Colby, Middlebury, Colgate, Hamilton, Bucknell, Kenyon, Lafayette, Denison, Trinity in Conn, and Trinity in Texas.</p>
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<p>Interestingly, almost all of them. </p>
<p>Football, and the money spent on it, is the Title IX gorilla for the big schools … any school with a big time football program is going to have a hard time carrying a full slate of men’s sports.</p>
<p>When you get to the smaller schools almost all have 25-30 varisty sports (men’s annd women’s) … they are not paying for scholarships, for huge facilities, or for lots of plane trips (van/bus rides) … so they can carry a lot of sports. My middle child plays soccer, basketball, and lacrosse … everyone has basketball … but it amazing how many more DIII schools have men’s soccer and lacrosse varsity teams than do DI schools. For example, virtually all the schools in the NESCAC (Williams, Amherst, etc) have a ton of varsity sports … it seems that is true for virtually all the top DIII schools. </p>
<p>If you’s like to check them out you can use this link to see which conference each school is in (<a href=“http://www.d3hoops.com%5B/url%5D”>http://www.d3hoops.com</a>) and then check the school’s web sites to see how many varsity sports they have. The DIII schools are much more supportive of “minor” sports!</p>
<p>3togo, what you say is true, and the following schools may meet your criteria, but they don’t meet mine: Swarthmore, Pomona, Haverford, Wesleyan, Vassar, Grinnell, Oberlin, Bard, Whitman, Occidental, Skidmore, Sarah Lawrence, Drew, Earlham.</p>
<p>I am looking for a certain vibe.
Williams has it, Haverford doesn’t.</p>
<p>I agree with Concerneddad about the “atmosphere” at Tulane (having attended a former Big 8, now Big 10 school). However, Tulane’s baseball team is currently ranked #1.</p>
<p>Is Tulane trying to get more rah-rah? I read somewhere that they just started up a marching band.</p>
<p>Attendance records in NCAA football</p>
<p>For 2003 <a href=“http://www.ncaa.org/stats/football/attendance/2003/2003footballattendance.pdf[/url]”>http://www.ncaa.org/stats/football/attendance/2003/2003footballattendance.pdf</a></p>
<p>2002 Teams with 70,000+ average attendance at footbal games
- Michigan 774,033 110,576
- Penn St. 857,911 107,239
- Tennessee 746,936 106,705
- Ohio St. 827,904 103,488
- LSU 632,147 90,307
- Georgia 605,640 86,520
- Florida 596,296 85,185
- Auburn 580,600 82,943
- Alabama 579,999 82,857
- South Carolina 492,828 82,138
- Florida St. 490,598 81,766
- Notre Dame 484,910 80,818
- Texas A&M 561,389 80,198
- Texas 474,319 79,053
- Wisconsin 624,182 78,023
- Nebraska 622,415 77,802
- Clemson 542,675 77,525
- Oklahoma 450,621 75,104
- Michigan St. 591,539 73,942
- Washington 500,042 71,435</p>
<p>2004 School Mens’ Basketball
- Kentucky 295,227 22,710
- Syracuse 371,018 21,825
- North Carolina 291,223 20,802
- Louisville 291,643 19,443
- Maryland 287,200 17,950
- Wisconsin 257,130 17,142
- Indiana 214,331 16,487
- Kansas 228,200 16,300
- Illinois 208,935 16,072
- Memphis 231,481 15,432
- Brigham Young 198,906 15,300
- Marquette 275,241 15,291
- Arkansas 236,676 14,792
- Michigan St. 206,626 14,759
- New Mexico 264,227 14,679
- North Carolina St. 233,223 14,576
- Arizona 218,418 14,561
- Ohio St. 217,817 14,521
- Fresno St. 232,663 13,686
- Connecticut 243,876 13,549</p>
<p>2003-2004 Women’s Basketball
1 Tennessee 201,638 14,403
2 Connecticut 201,521 13,435
3 Texas Tech 213,802 12,577
4 New Mexico 213,575 11,865
5 Purdue 121,258 10,105
6 Minnesota 145,545 9,703
7 Penn St. 135,383 9,670
8 Kansas St. 121,739 9,365
9 Iowa St. 144,380 8,021
10 Texas 115,057 7,191
11 Southwest Mo. 113,244 6,661
12 Notre Dame 99,750 6,650
13 Wisconsin 82,070 6,313
14 Duke 93,553 6,237
15 Oklahoma 73,981 5,691
16 Michigan St. 74,371 5,312
17 Kentucky 72,553 5,182
18 Baylor 65,321 4,666
19 Fresno St. 62,933 4,495
20 Washington 68,076 4,255</p>
<p>2003 NCAA Division I Women’s Soccer Average Attendance
School Games Total Att. Avg. Att.
- Texas A&M 12 23,724 1,977
- Texas 7 11,266 1,609
- Fresno St. 6 9,641 1,607
- Florida 16 24,932 1,558
- North Carolina 11 16,239 1,476
- Brigham Young 13 19,097 1,469
- Duke 9 12,900 1,433
- Portland 12 15,909 1,326
- Georgia 9 11,675 1,297
- Indiana 7 8,466 1,209</p>
<p>dstark … I agree … when I look at my kids (assuming the stats to make this possible) kid #1 seems like a Swarthmore or Wellesley type kid; she might get involved with the soccer team but will not go to other teams events or much rah-rah sport … kid #2 might be able to play DIII sports in college and definitely will want to go to a school where people go and support the teams like a Williams. </p>
<p>For me, this is another dimension of fit … for example, for my #2 child while Williams is in an isolated location I doubt he would feel isolated or that nothing is going on there because he would feed off the athletic stuff going on on campus.</p>
<p>These are great questions … and one example of why I believe we don’t want stats driven admissions … Williams and Swarthmore are both TERRIFIC schools and both have very strong personalities that will fit some kids like a glove and other kids will dislike; personally I find schools with strong personalitites as terrific options for the kids for which that personality fits.</p>
<p>xiggi, the only problem that I have with the type of stats posted-above, is that it hard to then gauge schools that are up-and-comers in the attendance game. To use Oregon as an example (because I am a DUCK, and a season ticket holder). When Autzen Stadium held 40,000 we filled it (at least since 1994). When we added 16,000 or so new seats two years ago, we continued to fill it – each and every week. And, given the “pressure” on single game tickets, we could probably fill it every week if we added another 20,000 seats.</p>
<p>The same is true for DUCK basketball. Venerable old Mac Court only holds about 9,000. And, it is packed both the men and women (almost, but still a PAC-10 best). The school has just acquired land to build a new arena, and so we will see a substantial increase in capacity.</p>
<p>So, while not there in numbers, the enthusiasm (read money) is there for the program to grow. I have lived in other college towns: New Haven, Boulder, Norman and now Eugene. In my experience, only Norman beats Eugene in raw enthusiasm for its teams. As Lloyd Carr said after we beat Michigan at Autzen Stadium: “That is the loudest stadium I have ever heard.” </p>
<p>Ok, this DUCK Honk as said his piece: Quack, Quack!</p>
<p>“Smaller schools mentioned so far include Williams, Amherst (really?), Davidson, Dartmouth, Bowdoin, Colby, Middlebury, Colgate, Hamilton, Bucknell, Kenyon, Lafayette, Denison, Trinity in Conn, and Trinity in Texas”</p>
<p>Dstark I think that is a good list. My son applied to half of those schools and will be going to Colgate - there is a common theme there. </p>
<p>As far as Div III - I think Lafayette may be Div I - at least in some sports.</p>
<p>Yeah, and then you have Cameron indoor Stadium which only holds around 9300. However, the Cameron Crazies tent out for months in advance in order to get in to a game! I heard that some of these kids have been tenting since December in anticipation of Sunday’s Wake Forest game…</p>
<p>D stark,</p>
<p>I looked up D 3 basketball and baseball. Two teams made BOTH high ranked D3 lists & also have high caliber academics: they are Williams & Trinity (Ct.)</p>
<p>Basketball schools with good rankings & academics:
Amherst, St Lawrence, Hamilton, Wittenberg, Franklin & Marshall, Lawrence</p>
<p>Baseball Schools with same:
Emory, Denison, Allegheny </p>
<p>Note: Johns Hopkins is also very highly ranked in Baseball… not a rah rah school, but maybe for Basball? Surely an excellent school.</p>
<p>Rice, Tulane, Vandy & Notre Dame all top 25 D-1 schools… probably very very hard to have an athletic “hook” there unless your kid is a superstar.</p>
<p>jrpar, did he apply to any schools not on the list that are sports oriented?
For those with lower grades, how about Muhlenberg, College of Wooster, Ohio Wesleyan, University of Puget Sound, Willamette, and Linfield?</p>
<p>SBmom, thanks, there are quite a few schools that can make this list. More than I thought.</p>
<p>Dstark, yes, but the other schools were much bigger Div I schools (he liked big AND small schools!): BC, USC, UVA and Michigan.
How about Wash U? They are strong in several Div III sports; he applied there too.<br>
School spirit was very important to him.</p>