What's Wrong With The Patriot League?

In the epicenter of the Patriot League, this weekend's games in the Lehigh Valley should have been standouts.

At 12:30, Lehigh hosted its first home game in a month, honoring two championship teams from its recent past. Instead, the Engineers drew a season low 4,115 at Goodman Stadium. A decade ago, that same game drew over 7,000.

Down the road at Fisher Field, it was homecoming at Lafayette, coming off a bye week and a win over Central Connecticut. This game, scheduled for 3:30 pm after the Lehigh game , drew an announced crowd of 4,657,  but may have been half that.

Lehigh and Lafayette are a combined 2-10 this season. Six of seven PL teams are under .500, and only Colgate (6-0) and Georgetown (3-4) have more than one win all season. In this week's Sagarin ratings, the PL ranked 11th of 13 I-AA conferences, ahead of the SWAC and the nonscholarship Pioneer. Over the last two seasons, the PL is 15-51 (.227) out of conference, and outside of undefeated Colgate, its record this season is 4-24 (.142).

It's a question which needs to be asked--what's wrong with the Patriot League?

It wasn't always this way, of course. Five different schools shared conference titles in the 2000's. Either Colgate or Lehigh could get to the second or third round of the NCAA playoffs in a good year, and aside from Georgetown, nearly every team had a good chance at a run at the top three of the league. Since 2012, PL schools (sans Georgetown) have been able to offer full scholarships to some of the best recruits in the subdivision.

So what went wrong? Or, better stated, what is going wrong?

In 2011, the last year before the Patriot League approved scholarships, the PL was a mere 20-16 (.555) out of conference, and there was consensus that a move to scholarships would elevate PL teams along side that of CAA Football and far past their Ivy opponents, never mind the Northeast Conference. In reality, the other conferences stepped up while the Patriot League scholarship model was flawed from the start, and remains so.

Much has been discussed about the Ivy model, but some of our readers may not know the detail. As is its mantra, the Ivy league eschews athletic scholarships because, well, they're the Ivy League, and it wouldn't be sporting to give some admission to a school of such repute strictly for carrying a ball. What has changed is the cost of admission, and the decision of nearly every Ivy school to match the largesse of Harvard, Yale, and Princeton to make attendance exceptionally affordable to any student with a household income below $150K...and that includes football. Families with a household income under $60,000 (and in some cases, as high as $100K) do not have any "parent contribution" if offered admission, and thus an offer at Harvard or Dartmouth is free tuition.

How about a family of $150K? "There is no income cutoff for financial aid awards," reads the Yale web site. "Some families with over $200,000 in annual income receive need-based aid from Yale."

What the Ivy was able to do is combine the leverage of financial aid with the power of admission--would you rather have a scholarship at Holy Cross or free tuition at Harvard? 

In doing so, this has opened the door for high-GPA football prospects from middle income quartiles who write off the Ivy before as too expensive, and for those schools that can sell the career opportunities of these schools, it's a strong combination, and thus the quantity and quality of Ivy recruits has improved while the PL assumed its scholarship model would attract more of its target demographic.

The Northeast Conference was a wildcard. Never considered a peer of the Patriot, a conference that grew up alongside the MAAC Football League went to a 30 scholarship model about a decade ago. What it has done is take the quasi-cost containment scholarship model and add a twist that the Patriot League didn't do.

The PL scholarship mode is an "all or none" approach: the school can award up to 60 scholarships, but it is all merit. A PL school does not offer, for example, 30 scholarships and 30 need-based equivalencies to get to 60. By allowing merit and need based aid as part of its awards, NEC schools are now able to get close to 60 and be competition for bowl-eligible major conference schools, which is why Duquesne got a guarantee game at Hawaii, or why Wagner is playing Syracuse.

NEC schools are spending less to get just as much visibility as PL schools, and do not have the artificial admissions barrier of the Academic Index to attract (or in the PL's case, repel) recruits to its schools. By most accounts, the NEC is a stronger conference than the Patriot League right now.

Again, so what went wrong?

The Patriot League saw scholarships as the cure and not a symptom of the problem: to be competitive you must attract and admit quality recruits.  It's supply and demand.

The PL scholarship model did not expand the base of recruits because it still pays homage to the Ivy League admissions model, which limits the "pool" to approximately 10-12 percent of the high school football seniors out there. And of those 12 percent, if they're not taking an offer at Stanford, Notre Dame, Northwestern, etc., the Ivy is now a much stronger financial offer than a scholarship at Bucknell or Fordham, never mind Georgetown.

On one flank, the Ivy is restricting supply, while the NEC has elevated itself by being a more realistic option for recruits head to head vs. the PL, and gets stronger in comparison with the entire pool and not just the elite. It's no longer  a sure thing that a recruit picks Colgate over Bryant every time, and while the PL wins more than it loses, the NEC is picking off talent here and there on the margin that make a difference.

Let's call Patriot League scholarships what they are--a transfer cost from a financial aid award to an athletic department award, but the same award to the same group of kids with the same talent level that they had before, and those kids are increasingly getting a better offer from the Ivy League.

The League is seeing it at signing day and they are seeing it on the field. Over the last two seasons, the Patriot League is 5-17 (.227) head to head versus Ivy schools. Of those five PL wins, three are against one team: Cornell.

Scholarships come at a price in the Patriot League, literally.

In 2011, the league (minus Georgetown) spent a collective $26 million on football expenses. In 2017, it increased to $36 million, with Lafayette's budget for football increasing 52 percent in six years and Bucknell by 80 percent. The six PL schools now rank among the 20 largest budgets in the subdivision and by any measure, aren't getting its collective money's worth. We can debate where Georgetown fits into this but the issue is bigger than Georgetown. The PL went all-in for scholarship football and they are, for now, the worse for wear.

But if we conclude that scholarships all are that's ailing the Patriot League right now, we're not being honest.

The league as a whole, as a competitive entity, as a collective entity--needs work. It falsely assumed that 60 grants would be all it needed. Now, it's a damaged brand in football circles and a group where not everyone is on the same page. That kind of change won't come from its Council of Presidents, who meet twice a year and frankly have bigger issues at their institutions than to worry about why Lehigh is 1-5 in mid-October. Change must come from the league office, who must be empowered by their presidents to make the Patriot League the best it can be, not be the best it hopes to be.

The strongest athletic conferences are traditionally those who employ an active and visible commissioner. Jim Delany and Greg Sankey aren't powerful because of who they are but what they are able to do. As commissioners of the Big Ten and SEC, they have presented their presidents with opportunities for remarkable growth that, while unlikely for the PL, nonetheless show that change with purpose is not a bad thing. 

"Change" and "Patriot League" don't always go hand in hand. As a reflection its roots, the PL has looked upon change with a certain amount of distrust--the Ivy doesn't change, why should they?  Football has seen much of this. Were it not for Fordham's not so veiled threat of leaving the PL, the league would have never signed of on scholarships. The league under commissioner Carolyn Femovich sold the PL brand ("Today's Scholar-Athletes, Tomorrow's Leaders") over the product--now, Jennifer Heppel must fix the product.

Femovich came to the PL from a long career as an athletic administrator at the University of Pennsylvania. If all you know is the comfortable world of  Ivy athletics, the PL probably seems to be just where it needs to be. Heppel has worked twice at the Big Ten, and for five years at Georgetown as an associate athletic director. She knows a world beyond the Lehigh Valley, and governs a conference where just half of its members actually play football in the league, and none have seriously challenged for a national title in 15 years. There was a time when that didn't matter as long as the school presidents could enjoy a regular trip to Princeton or Dartmouth and enjoy a catered lunch in the president's suite; today, those games are growing less likely with outcomes that show the cracks in the PL model.

Heppel does not need a six-figure consultant's report to understand how to fix Patriot League football, but she does need the support of the conference's presidents to address five issues which were not addressed in the 2012 scholarship decision and will continue to distract and disrupt this league going further.

1. Address the scholarship rules. The NCAA limits athletic department aid to 63 equivalencies among 85 counters, but the PL does not permit need based aid in the formula.  Adopting the NCAA model does not impact the academic model of the PL and allows for schools to be more flexible in how they choose to apportion aid, and addresses the depth issues that are more than apparent on the field in recent years versus peer schools.

2. Revisit Redshirting. The PL's ban on redshirts is redolent of its Ivy League origins and does not address the competitive issues of modern Division I football. 

The web site USA Football offers these four reasons why redshirting ins not anti-academics, but may actually be to the PL's benefit. it writes:

• 1. Get settled on campus: Remember, these will be some of the best years of your life, so redshirting provides one more year to thoroughly enjoy that college experience. There are a plethora of opportunities on campus, but it is up to each individual to make the best out of the journey.
• 2. Time to adjust: Redshirting buys more time to get yourself acclimated to the collegiate setting. Summer school provides a taste of what college life will be like, but there's nothing like going through a full semester without traveling and allowing yourself a chance to build a solid and sound academic profile.
• 3. A fifth year: Redshirting provides an opportunity to graduate earlier, so you can explore master’s programs with that final year of eligibility. By redshirting, this opens up that fifth year of a scholarship to maximize potential in the classroom. I assure you, coaches won't vouch for those who choose just to skate by.
• 4. A chance to mature: Athletes who redshirt have the chance to learn the playbook and get stronger in the weight room. If you take heed to your strength coach’s plan, your body will be transformed. Couple this with talent, and you'll be ready to compete for a starting job.

The PL has traditionally steered away from redshirts in no small part to protect its two colleges (Lafayette, Holy Cross) which would not be able to offer graduate courses in the fifth year. That is not to say that players could not extend their baccalaureate studies to nine semesters to get the fifth year in, but it's the kind of conversation that the league needs to have as recruits continue to see that redshirts aren't welcome...and they look elsewhere.

Another conversation in this category; the world beyond redshirts. In addition to redshirts, there are now a number of variants on the formula which may or may not play well in all PL circles: a greenshirt (an athlete enrolls a semester early to practice with the team), a grayshirt (an recruit enrolls a semester late in January for eligibility purposes), or even a blueshirt (a players plays as a walk-on his first year, and receives a scholarship thereafter, counting the scholarship for next year). If the student is duly admitted to the school, should the school care when he enrolls?

3. Scheduling and Support. Patriot League scheduling is all over the board and attendance is waning. Outside of Holy Cross, teams are finding it harder to maintain a purely regional schedule and the recent downtown in results are leaving lots of seats empty by October.

The league needs to give serious thought to a conference-wide scheduling philosophy, such as the 1-2-2- model: one FBS/I-A game annually (on the road),  two Ivy or CAA games (home and away)  and two games against smaller opponents (home only) . A school like Lehigh, for example, could schedule at Army, home Princeton, at Villanova, and then two home games with Marist and Bryant. That assures not less than six home games every year even with a I-A guarantee game, and avoids a 0-fer in non-conference play.

The goal is not to reduce Lehigh's scheduling opportunities but raise the game across the  league. Georgetown and Bucknell are traditionally softer in September scheduling, Holy Cross more regional, and Colgate more adventurous. The league needs all oars in the same direction, whatever that direction will be.

With that direction, there needs to be a concerted effort to bring fans back to these games. Winning helps, but winning isn't the only thing. If the experience at these schools is a negative to fans and their families, there are too many other options for the weekend entertainment dollar that will consume their interest. From the pre-game to halftime to post-game, the PL product isn't very appealing.

Why did Lafayette draw so poorly at its own homecoming last week? Was it the opponent, the start time, the tailgating restrictions, the game on local TV, or the general lack of interest in sitting at Fisher Field for an opponent that doesn't mean that much to them? Or maybe all of the above?

I'm reminded by a quote in the Georgetown Voice from former quarterback Bruce Simmons on who is showing up to games.

"The fanbase has changed quite a bit, because that day it was 99.9 percent students and dates, and now it is, I would guess, 65 percent alumni and parents and 35 percent undergrad," he said. "I do think the students would respond if someone made an effort to include them more openly and make it more fun for them."

What is the PL doing in this regard? Good intentions notwithstanding, very little.

4. Talk To Georgetown. It's time the PL had a heart-to-heart talk with Jack DeGioia.

DeGioia isn't interested in scholarship football, and as long as he's president that isn't likely to change. Some of that is a reflection on his college days in the Division III era, some of it due to the imbalance basketball places on the Georgetown athletic budget, and some of its from an a highly academic view of scholarships as somehow antithetical to the academy. Football scholarships were not part of  the "ethos and culture" of Georgetown, DeGioia said in 2012. Never mind that track scholarships or golf scholarships or volleyball scholarships don't seem to be against the "ethos", but football scholarships do.

But despite these last two weeks of good feeling, Georgetown has been materially undercompetitive in football in the last six years and the details need not be revisited here. The PL leadership needs to get the Georgetown leadership on board to working to meet 60 equivalencies even if it means committing to 60 equivalencies of need based aid.

Yes, getting to 60 equivalencies would open Georgetown to I-A FBS guarantee games, which would be a fascinating subject all its own, but not for today. But what it really does is get Georgetown out of the sub-basement where it is not competitive within its own league.

What would it take for Georgetown to offer 60 need based equivalencies? Would it take more recruiting outside the Northeast, an admissions adjustment from the league, or just more financial aid than it is offering right now? Whatever the answer, the PL leadership needs Georgetown to step it up or it should look elsewhere.

5. Expansion. "We are creating a model others will follow," Rev. John Brooks S.J. of Holy Cross once proclaimed about the Patriot League. But even Brooks admitted that "so far, no one has followed."

Putting aside Brook's intentions, every other I-AA conference has expanded and at seven, not only has no one followed the Patriot League, but it runs a particular risk.

With seven schools, the League is one school above the NCAA minimum for a football conference. Should anyone leave for whatever reason, the viability of the PL is in significant danger, especially if a member other than Georgetown or Fordham left. The PL mandates six league teams sponsor any league sport but football was grandfathered in at five. A four team PL plus associate members might lead to its implosion.

Expansion has been a touchy subject in PL circles because, well, those that are considered aren't interested, and those that are interested aren't considered. To be frank, those that are considered (Villanova, Richmond, William & Mary) aren't interested, and those that are interested (Marist, Monmouth, and the former program at Hofstra) aren't considered.

The league needs to expand, plain and simple. First, though, it must discern whether football needs to be a required sport among league members, such as basketball is. There was once a time, as late as the 1980's, when schools did not sponsor men's basketball and still maintained conference memberships -- Tulane, Miami, and San Francisco were all examples of this at one time-- but no more.  You can't be in the Big Ten and not play football. You can't be in the Ivy League and not play football. But you can be in the Patriot League and not play football.

Maybe after the league has that heart-to-heart talk with Georgetown, it sits down with American, Boston U, and Loyola and says, as an example, "Football is important to us and we expect our member schools to all play football, either as the academies do at I-A, or as the rest of the league does in our conference. If you want to remain as a full member of the league, you need to come up with a plan to add football over the next 4-6 years. If you don't, you need to prepare an exit plan."

A new football program needs three things: money, facilities, and tradition. Boston U has all three, Loyola has facilities but neither the money nor a tradition, and American has none of these. But, let's be clear--do these schools want to stay in the PL, and will they commit to do so, or is PL football this more of a scheduling arrangement than a commitment of like minded schools?

Certainly, a 10 team PL with Boston U, Loyola, and American introduces some change and a pair of closer rivals for Georgetown, and spares the PL from adding schools it is not comfortable with. Even one school out of the three adds stability and a common purpose. Or maybe the PL presidents grin and bear it... and calls Marist.

This isn't the Ivy League. Either the PL must grow or it runs the risk of atrophy and a slow death.

Because in the end, what's wrong with the Patriot League is almost entirely self-inflicted, which is both hopeful as well as challenging. Leadership, not platitudes, will set a course for its stability and future.