The Division III season is wrapped up with a bow and under the tree in time for Christmas. So while the Bowl Championship Subdivision is still dragging on, Around the Nation is on its second dose of reflecting back on the season that was.

In Part 1, we dealt with the best performances our 239 teams put forth in 1,240 games in 2008. Our second installment veers off the beaten path a little, revisiting preseason picks, checking out in-season pics and highlighting a handful of things we'll remember about the season for various reasons.

This installment is the second of two.

Dec. 20: Great games, plays, statistics, players and coaches
Jan. 8: Great teams, best of the Stagg Bowl, our awards, revisiting preseason predictions, photos of the year and miscellaneous memorables

The memorable teams
In the ultimate team game, where perfect execution by 10 can be undone by a single miscalculation, these honors are not bestowed lightly. A team is practically a living organism itself. Coming together to function as one is an accomplishment. Functioning exceptionally is outstanding.

Remember the remarkable rises
Mount Union hoisted the Walnut and Bronze. Champions always deserve respect, but perhaps nothing this season was more impressive than LaGrange’s vault from 0-20 in program history to 9-1 and the playoffs. No team has ever improved by so many wins in a season. Around the Nation touched base with coach Todd Mooney after a win against Birmingham-Southern in Week 1, and Jason Bowen’s Around the South checked in in October. The SLIAC certainly wasn’t the toughest conference, and Millsaps humbled the Panthers in the first round. But getting a team familiar with defeat to become winners so consistently deserves a tip of the hat.

Remember the notable steps forward
You very likely followed a favorite team or conference this season. ATN tries to follow all 239 and the 29 groups they’re assembled in. There are feel-good (and feel-bad) stories we both might have missed. To find them, ATN took a look at the increase and decrease in wins from last season for the 238 teams that played in 2007.

LaGrange, No. 217 in the Kickoff '08 ranking of the full field, wasn’t the only team to make a big improvement. According to the D3football.com database, here are the other schools that improved by three wins or more:

13 teams had three more wins in '08 than in '07: Cortland State (11-2/8-3), Delaware Valley (8-3/5-5), Framingham State (5-5/2-7), Hardin-Simmons (9-2/6-4), Hiram (3-7/0-10), Huntingdon (8-2/5-5), Millsaps (11-1/8-2), MIT (5-5/2-7), Muskingum (3-7/0-10), Simpson (7-3/4-6), UW-Stevens Point (9-2/6-4), Wheaton (11-3/8-2) and WPI (7-3/4-6).

14 had four more wins: Averett (4-6/0-10), Beloit (5-5/1-9), Carleton (7-3/3-7), Catholic (9-2/5-5), Johns Hopkins (8-3/4-6), Loras (6-4/2-8), Lycoming (7-4/3-7), MacMurray (4-6/0-10), Monmouth (11-1/7-3), Otterbein (9-2/5-5), Rowan (8-2/4-4), Thomas More (8-2/4-6), Trine/Tri-State (10-1/6-4) and Wooster (8-2/4-6).

Carleton senior Nick Brom walks with the Goat Trophy down St. Olaf Ave. in Northfield, flanked by senior Chris Gardner, left, and junior Phil Blue. The Knights missed out on the playoffs after a last-second touchdown by St. John's in the season finale but still had one of the best turnarounds of the season. Photo by Pat Coleman, D3sports.com

Two had five more wins: Aurora (9-2/4-6) and St. Thomas (7-3/2-8).

One had seven more wins: Willamette (11-1/4-6).

One had nine more wins: LaGrange (9-2/0-10).

Remember the notable steps backward
To fall back more than a few wins in 2008, a team generally must have had a pretty successful 2007. That explains how national semifinalist Bethel, who backslid by seven wins (12-2 to 5-5 in the ultracompetitive MIAC), and quarterfinalist Central, who dropped by six (12-1 to 6-4), have the biggest difference in win total. Based on history alone, those traditionally successful programs are likely to rebound from off seasons.

Others on this list might be in the early stages of an overall decline. Some get caught standing still in a wave of improvement among conference rivals. Still others were ravaged by injuries or inexperience, and we won’t venture a guess as to what the future holds.

No matter the reason, here are the teams who backslid by at least three wins:

21 had three fewer wins: Bridgewater (4-6 in 2008/7-3 in 2007), Capital (5-5/8-3), Coe (4-6/7-3), Dickinson (6-4/9-2), Geneva (5-5/8-2), Hope (3-7/6-4), Lawrence (1-9/6-4), Mass. Maritime (0-10/3-7), Mississippi College (5-5/8-2), Nichols (2-8/5-4), N.C. Wesleyan (6-4/9-3), Oberlin (2-8/5-5), Rochester (3-7/6-5), St. Lawrence (1-9/4-5), St. Norbert (7-3/10-1), UW-Eau Claire (6-4/9-3), UW-Oshkosh (4-5/7-3), Waynesburg (5-5/8-3), Wesleyan (1-7/4-4), Western Connecticut (2-8/5-6) and Whittier (1-8/4-5).

Four had four fewer wins: Colorado College (0-9/4-6), Pacific Lutheran (3-6/7-3), St. John Fisher (7-4/11-2), Widener (4-6/8-3)

Five had five fewer wins: Coast Guard (3-6/8-2), Dubuque (2-8/7-3), TCNJ (4-6/9-2), Olivet (1-9/6-5), Rockford (2-8/7-3)

One had six fewer wins: Central (6-4/12-1)

One had seven fewer wins: Bethel (5-5/12-2)

Remember that parity reigns in Weeks 1-15
With Mount Union and UW-Whitewater meeting at the Stagg Bowl for the fourth consecutive season, it was easy to get the impression Division III lacks parity. In reality, we have two programs that are a cut above everyone else, and parity galore in the levels below. Conference champions vary from season to season, the best rivalries tend to be toss-ups and the race for playoff spots is affected by everything, including the late West Coast game in Week 11.

Last year, 16 of the 32 playoff teams hadn’t been in the field the year before. In 2008, the playoffs featured only 14 teams from the 2007 field. Eighteen of the 32 were new.

Remember that conference respect is earned in the playoffs
ATN re-ranked Division III’s conferences (second item) at the end of September. But when the rankings are revised for 2009, ATN will have to consider that the champion of the HCAC (No. 22 of 27) made the round of eight, the champion of the No. 23 MWC was bounced from the round of 16 by a last-minute score and the runner-up in the No. 24 NEFC beat the champion of the No. 5 Empire 8. Franklin, Monmouth and Curry, thanks for making our job a lot harder. But kudos otherwise!

Remember that not everyone has done this before/been at this for long
A long way from anywhere, in Duluth, Minn., St. Scholastica proved closer to competitive than a lot of first-year teams are. The Saints were just 1-7, but included in the tally were three close losses on the road: In overtime at Macalester, by 7 at Wisconsin Lutheran and by 14 at Minnesota-Morris.

Remember how hard wins are to come by
Three teams with losing streaks of 20 games or longer won their openers. Hiram and Lewis & Clark broke 27-game skids, the latter dating from Oct. 2004 since the Pioneers played a four-game season in 2005. And LaGrange won its first game ever. ATN wrote about the trio after Week 1.

The turning of fortunes didn’t stop there. By the end of Week 3, all seven teams that went winless last season (Averett, Muskingum, MacMurray and St. Vincent were the others) experienced the thrill of victory. Most didn’t stop, as all but Lewis & Clark and St. Vincent went on to win at least three games. Hiram, 2-58 the previous six years, went 3-7.

In 2008, just six teams were winless. Mass. Maritime, McMurry, Cornell, Principia and Maranatha Baptist went 0-10. Colorado College went 0-9. Half of those programs – the latter three -- started camp with 55 players or fewer.

Remember how hard conference wins are to come by
If you’re a fan of a mildly successful team lamenting a down year, try to appreciate what you have. You could be a North Park backer. The Vikings, who play in the Holmgren Athletic Complex (yes, THAT Holmgren), never go 0-10, but they are overmatched in the mighty CCIW.

In a third consecutive 1-9 season, North Park managed to go 0-7 in-conference for the eighth year in a row. Their last CCIW win, against Elmhurst, 31-21, on Oct. 7, 2000, came 62 conference games ago.

Remember how hard winning streaks are to come by
The champions in Division I-A, I-AA and II all lost a game this season. Had Whitewater beaten Mount Union, the same would have been true in Division III. Instead, the Purple Raiders’ mark put them in rare company:

Mount Union, Division III, 15-0
Sioux Falls (S.D.), NAIA, 14-0
Utah, Division I-A, 13-0
Friends (Kan.), NAIA, 10-0
Trinity (Conn.), Division III, 8-0

In Friends’ case, the Falcons went 9-0 but were eliminated from the playoffs by Northwestern Oklahoma State, who later forfeited. The win was restored, but not in time to let Friends play a second-round playoff game.

Remember how hard conference winning streaks are to maintain
Again in regards to parity, conferences which had long been dominated by a single team got a jolt this season.

Plymouth State handed Curry its first NEFC Boyd loss in 29 games, going back to 2004, and its first overall NEFC loss in 37 games.
Monmouth handed St. Norbert its first NWC loss in 29 games.
UW-Stevens Point handed UW-Whitewater its first WIAC loss in 25 games.

Mount Union, however, extended its string of OAC wins to 30, dating from a 21-14 loss to Ohio Northern in 2005. It’s 32 if playoffs wins against Capital in 2005 and 2006 are counted.

Remember, there is such thing as a four-way tie
From Ryan Tipps:
"Last year or two years ago, there was a Daily Dose conversation saying that there are lots of three-way conference ties and that there was even one five-way conference tie (the Centennial back in '04) but that there hadn't been a four-way tie in recent history. Well, the ODAC changed that stat." Randolph-Macon, Hampden-Sydney, Emory & Henry and Catholic all went 4-2 in ODAC games. Amongst the foursome, only R-MC and CUA went 2-1, and the Yellow Jackets defeated the Cardinals, which is how the ODAC came to be represented in the playoffs by a 6-4 team.


Revisiting our preseason predictions is not always pretty, because who likes the taste of crow? Still, if you’re man enough to point out when you’re right, you have to admit when you’re wrong, at least in ATN. So while I might have been just trying to illustrate the wide-openness going into the season by not including Mount Union or UW-Whitewater in my final four pick on Kickoff '08s Predict This grid, I still have to claim it.

I also got some stuff right, thanks to Otterbein, Randolph-Macon and others, but the fun stuff is what I missed. Luckily I get to take anyone who ever made a Division III prediction or ranking down in flames with me.

Remember (or feel free to forget) our preseason predictions
As anyone who’s purchased our Kickoff preseason preview in any of the past four seasons knows, our Predict This! grid is one of the more fun features. We ask 15 questions to six experts, and we use that term loosely. Myself, Pat Coleman, Gordon Mann, Ryan Tipps, John McGraw and Adam Samrov took a stab in August, and here’s how our forecasts turned out (yes, we’re keeping score):

Linebacker Chas Yoder holds the Walnut and Bronze, Mount Union's 10th national championship trophy. Photo by RC Workman, D3sports.com

National champion: Mount Union.
Score a point for everyone but me. The guys went the safe (or smart) route. I figured the lack of returning starters for the Purple Raiders would open the door for some other elite team and took Wesley. Wait. It gets better.

Winner of each bracket.
Score one for Mann. Nobody got all four, but G-Mann got Mount Union, UW-Whitewater and UMHB. His fourth was Wesley, which we all picked. I was the only one who got zero. What? This year looked wide open, I swear.

Which WIAC team, if any, will beat UW-Whitewater?
Score no points. Coleman went with UW-Eau Claire, Tipps and I tried UW-La Crosse, and it was UW-Stevens Point that got the Warhawks in late October.

What 2007 playoff team will have the worst falloff, recordwise?
Score no points. Although all the experts picked teams that won fewer games than last season, including Tipps going for Central (-6) and Coleman and Samrov taking TCNJ (-5), no one hit the nail on the head, which was Bethel. The Royals, 12-2 and semifinalists last season, went 5-5. Maybe Tipps can have a half point for being closest.

Which team will be the most surprising playoff entry?
Score one for McMillan. You can file it under 'even a blind squirrel finds a nut’ if you want to. I called Otterbein to make the postseason as the OAC’s No. 2. And honestly, Montclair State (8-2, Coleman) and Albright (8-3, McGraw) weren’t far off. Samrov’s choice of Rochester (3-7) was though. Perhaps the 'most surprising’ playoff team was really 6-4 ODAC champ Randolph-Macon, but hey, who’s scoring this thing? Full point!

Record of the last team chosen in Pool C, and who?
Score none. Nobody got Wheaton at 8-2, although that was foreseeable. Tipps picked a Pool A team in St. John’s and nailed their 8-2 record, as did Coleman for Montclair State’s 8-2 mark. The Red Hawks were on the verge of the playoffs before a loss in Week 11 knocked them out. I’ll give those guys half-points.

Who will be the D3football.com Offensive Player of the Year?
Score one for everyone. We all got this no-brainer. Nate Kmic’s 2,790-yard season for the 15-0 national champions topped the other guys who put up crazy offensive numbers, from Hartwick to Franklin to Millsaps to Monmouth.

Who will be the D3football.com Defensive Player of the Year?
Score one for Mann, Tipps and Samrov, who all went with UW-Whitewater’s Jace Rindahl. The only player in college football history known to have played in more than 58 games – Rindahl was on the field for 60 games during the Warhawks’ four Stagg Bowl runs – wasn’t just along for the ride. He was a major factor against the run, in pass coverage and as a leader for UW-Whitewater. When Kmic said he stood out as the toughest defender he faced all year, we knew Rindahl was the right guy.

Nate Kmic needs 2,069 rushing yards to set the D-III record. How many does he get?
Score a half-point for McMillan. Per 'The Price is Right’ Rules (closest without going over), my 2,353 was the best of a bunch of picks in the 1,950-2,350 range. Except for Samrov, whose prediction of a 1,798-yard season was off by nearly 1,000.

Which team with a new coach will win the most games?
Score one for McMillan, Coleman, Tipps and McGraw. We actually went with different teams, the first three for Wabash, where Erik Raeburn stepped in for Chris Creighton and led the Little Giants to a 10-2 year. McGraw got a point out of Wartburg’s playoff run. The Knights (10-3) replaced Eric Koehler with former coach Rick Willis, and became a big factor in the Willamette Bracket during the postseason.

Which team with a new coach will improve its record the most?
Score another one for McMillan and Coleman. Under Glenn Caruso, St. Thomas went from 2-8 to 7-3, one better than the four-win improvement for Tipps’ pick, Mike Clark and Lycoming (7-4).

Which team will win the ODAC?
Aw, McMillan is on fire! The lone panelist to pick Randolph-Macon lucked into a point that Mann, Samrov and McGraw nearly had sewn up, until the Yellow Jackets’ second-half rally in their rivalry game knocked Hampden-Sydney out of a chance at the automatic bid.

Of the three Empire 8 playoff teams last season, which one has the best chance of getting back?
Score one for everyone but Tipps, seeing as the rest of us took Ithaca, the conference’s lone playoff rep this season. St. John Fisher and Hartwick, both playoff teams last season, tied Alfred for second place with 4-2 Empire 8 marks.

Which longtime rushing powerhouse will pass for more yards in the spread, UW-River Falls or Augustana?
Score one for McMillan, Coleman, Mann and Samrov. As those who watch closely know, some teams use the spread to compensate for inferior talent, and wing the ball all over the field. Others like how it sets up the running attack. Augustana seemed to stick with its ground mentality, passing for just 1,657 yards, or 166 per game. UW-River Falls passed for 2,023.

There was no right answer to the 15th question, which game are you most anticipating, though a point could be awarded to Mann for taking Salisbury-St. John Fisher, the four-overtime, 58-52 affair.

It appears the final tally crowns a chief expert who didn’t even have the good sense to take the gimme pick of Mount Union winning its playoff bracket:

McMillan 7.5 predictions out of 14
Coleman 6.5
Mann 6
Tipps 5 (two half-points)
Samrov 4
McGraw 4

Remember the logic behind preseason No. 1 votes
First off, I promise I don’t drink and poll.

Second, I admit that I voted for Wesley No. 1 in the preseason poll. But before you freak, hear me out.

On Post Patterns, CWRU70 referenced a Foxsports.com column by Pete Fiutak asserts that the idea for preseason polls "is to rank teams on how good they are going into the season and not where they will end up."

At the time, I explained why I agreed:

"What it means in our context is if you have a team with six starters back and a team with eight, it's hard to put faith in them right now. There's no doubt in my mind Mount Union or Whitewater could end the season as champion -- they might be starting off with virtual JV teams, but recruiting off three straight Stagg Bowls, and having five extra weeks of practice per year. I had to consider whether one of those teams right now at this moment was better than the playoff teams returning what they return; Voters have to consider whether one of those returning a handful of all-Americans might be better right now than the UWW and MUC who are going to need time to jell and develop."

Remember to take rankings and polls for what they’re worth
We coined a new phrase on Post Patterns this season, as we discussed whether polling is an inexact science, or an art. It’s an artscience! Within that framework, polls will be right some times because of careful thought put in by voters, and other times because of dumb luck. Either way, ATN is here to chart those hits and misses, if for no other reason than to check the credentials of those putting these things together.

In a brief review of how each preseason poll or ranking performed with the benefit of hindsight, ATN settled on some criteria:

1. Where Mount Union and UW-Whitewater were ranked in the preseason
2. If it ranked any of the non-Big Three teams in the final eight (Franklin, Wheaton, Cortland State, Washington & Jefferson or Wartburg)
3. How many teams that eventually made the 32-team playoff field showed up in the preseason ranking.
4. The lack of egregious missteps, such as ranking a team that finished .500 or below
5. Insight beyond re-ranking the teams as they ended the ’07 playoffs

D3football.com poll
Mount Union and UW-Whitewater: Ranked 1st and 2nd
Final eight hits: All eight ranked in top 23
Ranked teams in the playoff field: 15.
Missteps: No. 25 Mississippi College, although QB Adam Shaffer’s injury led to 5-5 season … No. 5 Bethel, No. 7 Capital and No. 9 Central were somewhat believable in those spots at season’s start. Bethel and Central were probably cases of looking at the past rather than projecting the future.
Original insight: If you’d used this poll as your guide, No. 21 Franklin, No. 22 Cortland State and No. 23 Wartburg as national quarterfinalists wasn’t that big a surprise.

Kickoff '08’s 1-239 ranking
Mount Union and UW-Whitewater were: No. 1 and No. 2
Final eight/Ranked teams: Same as D3football.com top 25
Missteps: Pat Coleman and I rank Division III top to bottom; Slotting everyone leaves you wide open for hindsight criticism. Yet No. 81 for Willamette, which improved from 4-6 to finish ranked fourth, might’ve looked favorable in preseason. … No. 112 Lycoming, No. 124 Monmouth, No. 133 Trine, No. 140 Thomas More and No. 198 Aurora made the playoffs. Ouch.
Original insight: Our top 25 is the D3football.com poll; the value here is in the depth of the ranking. We weren’t too far off on some other teams that had playoff runs: No. 26 Millsaps, No. 32 Hobart, No. 34 Hardin-Simmons, No. 35 Occidental, No. 39 Randolph-Macon, No. 46 Otterbein, No. 47 Christopher Newport and No. 48 UW-Stevens Point.

The Sporting News (formerly Street & Smith’s)
Mount Union and UW-Whitewater were: No. 1 and No. 4
Final eight hits: Six. Franklin is mentioned in others to watch, and there’s no sign of Cortland State in the entire preview.
Ranked teams in the playoff field: 14, but only six after the top eight.
Missteps: Washington & Jefferson at No. 2 ended up looking better than it seemed in the preseason … Wittenberg was never close to No. 11.
Original insight: The author, Mike Goens of the Florence (Ala.) Times Daily has been at this for as long as I can remember, and provides a pretty good independent-from-D3football.com viewpoint. He nailed Wartburg ahead of Central in the IIAC (Nos. 19 and 23), and put Curry at No. 21 in the preseason. The Colonels made the round of 16.

Lindy’s
Mount Union and UW-Whitewater were: No. 1 and No. 2
Final eight hits: Five. Wheaton, Franklin and Cortland State were unranked.
Ranked teams in the playoff field: 13, but just three from Nos. 15-25
Missteps: No NJAC team ranked? And again there’s Wittenberg at No. 11. … Bethel at No. 3 seemed high even after their semifinal appearance. But one could have made a good preseason case for the rest of this top 25.
Original insight: Give Lindy’s credit for W&J at No. 5, ahead of No. 9 St. John’s. That looked backwards in the preseason, but not bad when the dust settled. … The IIAC got a lot of credit (No. 13 Wartburg, No. 15 Central), but at least it was for the right team.

USA Today Sports Weekly
Mount Union and UW-Whitewater were: No. 1 and No. 3
Final eight hits: All eight
Ranked teams in the playoff field: 16
Missteps: In hindsight, St. John Fisher at No. 6 was way off, but at the time it wasn’t terrible. … The misses here (No. 7 Capital, No. 10 Bethel, No. 15 UW-Eau Claire, No. 19 Ohio Northern) are all excusable. Even Wesley at No. 2 with most of its roster back against UW-Whitewater’s all-new lineup at No. 3 could be argued.
Original insight: This one’s all Pat Coleman’s doing. However, it’s assembled in June, so it had the potential to be a lot different from what he and I came up with in Kickoff ’08 in late August. Turns out we maybe should’ve just kept my input out of it, as Pat was pretty dead-on. Nobody else was on the Millsaps (No. 23) bandwagon quite that early, and sneaking Franklin in at No. 25 turned out to be wise.

AFCA (coaches’ poll)
Mount Union and UW-Whitewater were: No. 1 and No. 2
Final eight hits: All eight in the top 23.
Ranked teams in the playoff field: 17
Missteps: Nos. 4 and 6 turned out to be too high for Capital and Salisbury … at No. 24, an Illinois Wesleyan sighting!
Original insight: This poll should perform best by comparison, since it’s first released on Sept. 23, after three weeks have been played. Also, the 40 guys voting know a thing or two about football. Eleven of the top 13 teams in this ranking went on to the playoffs. … Mount Union received 29 of 40 first-place votes in the initial poll, and got 39 after UW-Whitewater lost in midseason. In case you’re wondering, Coach Kehres doesn’t vote Mount Union No. 1.

Notes: The AFCA and D3football.com are the only "polls." The others are rankings … The absence of Don Hansen’s Football Gazette in 2008 was partially due to the publication’s namesake spending parts of the fall in the hospital. We might have treated the publication like competition in the past, but ATN hopes to see the man get well.


We covered it five ways to, uh, Saturday afternoon, so there’s little need to rehash. If you were interested in the championship game, you were there, or followed along somehow. But you might have missed some of the surrounding pomp and circumstance, which can be almost as fun as the game itself. Here are some links to our coverage from that weekend -- don’t miss Frank Rossi, Ryan Tipps and Pat drooling over Miss Virginia – and some additional insights:

Frank Rossi took a first-hand look at the events around the Stagg Bowl from a first-timer's perspective on the Daily Dose.
Ryan Tipps blogged during the game,
The discussion on whether Mount Union and UW-Whitewater will meet again in Salem next season is underway.
Stagg Bowl photo galleries include the tailgaters, pregame, halftime and the postgame celebration and awards.

Remember how championships are won
Had it been scored like a boxing match, say with each possession representing a round, Mount Union might have won the first few rounds of the championship bout, and later trailed on the judges’ scorecards. But that’s not how football, where red-zone defense, the kicking game and a quick-strike offense can all play a role, works.

The story of the game, beyond the two early Greg Micheli-to-Cecil Shorts strikes, became four UW-Whitewater forays deep into Mount Union territory resulting in only six points. The Warhawks figured out how to drive the ball on the Purple Raiders, only to feel their defense tighten up inside the 30. That All-American kicker Jeff Schebler, 22 of 29 on FGs coming into the game, missed from 39 and 42 yards on two of those four attempts, didn’t help the Whitewater cause.

Some might see that as a dig at the Purple Raiders, but you could also look at it as a compliment to their craftiness, to their ability to get the most – football-score-wise – out of each possession. That they led a game they’d in some ways been outplayed in 31-13 at one point demonstrates their championship mettle.

Remember to stop talking and listen
As fans, sometimes we get so wrapped up in the hopes for our team we lose perspective on reality. On occasion though, fans really do know what they’re talking about, and we here at D3football.com are well served when we listen.

In the parking lot in Salem, among the camaraderie, ATN talked Stagg Bowl with some of the fans we’ve come to know over several trips. A couple of familiar faces, Skunk and Skunk’s Sidekick, told us Larry Kehres and Mount Union, led by dominant RB Nate Kmic, would come out passing the ball. I don’t remember if it was just because he figured UW-Whitewater would load up to stop Kmic or because he had spotted a weakness in the secondary, but whatever the reason, the word that filtered down to Mount Union fans proved true. Micheli’s connections on a couple of deep posts to Shorts early gave Mount Union a cushion it never relinquished.

Remember that necessity is the father of invention
Division III teams and their fans might not have access to all the perks, but they’re definitely top of the line when it comes to ingenuity. This season, in response to the confusion that arises when frequent Post Patterns users introduce themselves with their real names, our fans came prepared with nametags (see picture)

Remember that coaches are much more than X's and O's
The best part of the Stagg Bowl is always the game, but there are lots of other reasons to attend. The Gagliardi Trophy ceremony, the Friday luncheon and the pregame tailgate with fans from across the nation are highlights. One of ATN’s favorite spots is the hospitality room for coaches, NCAA officials and media types in the Hotel Roanoke. And trust us, it’s not because of the wings and assorted snacks on hand.

The opportunity to pick the brains of coaches and some of the most knowledgeable folks Division III has to offer is invaluable.

This year, it started for me by running into Hampden-Sydney coach Marty Favret. Whenever we cross paths, we inevitably reminisce about a 1996 game in which he was Catholic’s offensive coordinator and I was a Randolph-Macon defensive back, and one of us got the best of the other. Then we reminisce about 1997, when the other one got even.

But this year, the insights ranged on the relative strength of Huntingdon (as good as anyone the Tigers played), the best defensive player he’s ever had to prepare for (either Randolph-Macon linebacker Tim Armoska, a teammate of mine in the mid-1990s who has since passed on, or Dickinson linebacker Eric Dube, a 2007 All-American) and the R-MC/H-SC rivalry being significant again.

There were things said, of course, not really for attribution, and that’s sort of the point. If I could pick the brains of D-III coaches with their guards down all day, we could certainly have much more insightful discussions on our boards and such than we already do. These coaches live our game.

Another probably-not-for-attribution, off-the-cuff moment took place between Millsaps’ Mike DuBose and Trinity’s Steve Mohr, at midfield prior to their Week 9 (Nov. 1) game in San Antonio. Lamenting the SCAC’s restrictions on travel rosters, DuBose suggested he plays completely different lineups on special teams in home and road games. Mohr jokingly suggested DuBose make things more interesting by leaving star quarterback Juan Joseph out of the game.

Sometimes more than the specifics, seeing the respect or camaraderie between opposing coaches (Larry Kehres with his arm around Bob Berezowitz before the 2006 Stagg Bowl comes to mind) reminds us that they’re in it for the love of the game too.

I got a kick out of watching video of UW-Whitewater and Mount Union with St. John’s offensive coordinator Jimmy Gagliardi in the hospitality room the night before the Stagg Bowl.

Gagliardi thought back to the 2003 St. John’s team that beat Mount Union in Salem, and shared an insight I’d never really thought about. He recalled that on the play that changed the game, a 51-yard Blake Elliott TD run, the Purple Raiders defended it exactly as they should have, and a play made by a special athlete made it irrelevant.

That might be the secret to Mount Union’s success as much as anything, Gagliardi opined. The Purple Raiders are as well coached as anyone, but on the times when a play breaks down, or both sides execute their assignments, MUC often has those players whose talent tips the scales. Whereas St. John’s over the past few years might have had one exceptional player in Elliott – the kind that makes a solid team special – Mount Union had three of those on offense alone in this year’s Stagg Bowl: quarterback Greg Micheli, running back Nate Kmic and wide receiver Cecil Shorts.


These guys love the game as much as they love their art; there isn’t big money in shooting little-known players at little-known schools. But there is a certain sense of satisfaction in capturing the indelible images that Division III fans will remember for years to come.

In previous seasons, that’s been St. John’s’ Elliott getting two feet in the back of the end zone as the official rules him out of bounds; Mount Union’s Pierre Garcon going airborne to cross the goal line in the Stagg Bowl and a player from Northwestern (Minn.) running through the sprinklers, which inadvertently came on during a key moment in the game.

Here are some of 2008’s memorable stills, as selected by D3sports.com photographers who shot them:



By Scott Pierson
Concordia-Moorhead quarterback Jesse Nelson celebrates a 26-yard touchdown run against then-No. 4 St. John’s. The TD ended up being the game-winner, as the Cobbers upset the Johnnies, 9-7, in Collegeville, Minn.



By Daniel Harris
Says Harris: "The officials’ calls, or lack thereof, all balance in the end. After Menlo scored on its first possession, the kickoff was short. As one of the wedge blockers (Brandon Johnson) fielded the ball, his knee touched the ground and he just stood for a moment and everyone else slowed. He soon realized there had been no whistle, so he took off. He was eventually tackled, but not until he was near midfield. The Menlo coaching staff was going nuts and then Whittier scored on their first or second play. Later, Menlo caught a break when a Poet receiver had his helmet ripped off his head (see the picture) and no flag was thrown. The Whittier coaches were now the ones going crazy. The defensive player handed the helmet back and the end glared at the official as he held his helmet out, body language asking, "What gives?"


By Daniel Harris
Whitworth’s Adam Anderson prepares to haul in a touchdown pass despite tight coverage from Menlo defensive back Jaronimo Wright.


By Matt Milless
When Ithaca, in blue, and Utica played on Oct. 25 (Week 8), weather conditions were rain, rain and more rain


By Matt Milless
Form-tackle, kids. Lebanon Valley at Wilkes.


By Lou Rabito
Western Connecticut State coach John Burrell complains to officials during the Colonials' 49-18 loss to Rowan, a defeat that started their season-ending six-game losing streak.


By Pat Coleman
Seniors Mac McDonald and John Hanks turn the eagle atop a statue in the Northfield, Minn., town square to face Carleton's campus. It's the traditional end to The Walk, taken by the winning team when Northfield's D-III schools, Carleton and St. Olaf, meet.


By Lou Rabito
Muhlenberg receiver Edward DeRisi traps the ball against his facemask for one of his game-high seven catches during the Mules' first-round playoff loss to Wesley on Nov. 22.


By Ryan Coleman
This photo of Wartburg coach Rick Willis quickly became the galleries’ most viewed photo, with 40,000 views in less than a month and, as of Jan. 8, 75,292 (684/day).


By Matt Milless
Another kick? Maybe, although there might be some significance to the participation of Lebanon Valley’s Brittany Ryan. She was 3-for-3 on field goals (long of 30), 27-for-30 on extra points.


Our seasons are all about the game, and yet they are so much more than that. With help from those we worked with this season, here are hand-picked memories and insights, including some we haven’t been able to share with you yet:

Look out, Stone Station and Stiftungsfestivities. Photo by Keith McMillan, D3sports.com

D3football.com staffers have always heaped praise on Bridgewater's Stone Station as king of the Division III tailgates, and with good reason. But now that ATN has seen how the Franklin Grizzlies do it, the title is up for grabs.

ATN has audio of the entire back story, but suffice to say that with dual smokers, french fries made from fresh potatoes on site and fans friendly enough to welcome a stranger, Franklin backers are tailgating how we always envisioned it.

ATN would love to see a Franklin-Stone Station challenge at the Stagg Bowl in '09, with the title of best Division III tailgate on the line. Will both sides accept? Will a third party (St. John's Stiftungsfestivities?) step in to snatch the belt? Does it matter who "loses," since we all win when Division III fans get together?

Remember what a big crowd looks like on our level
When a school gets as much play on the evening news as the local pro teams and has fans who have never set foot on campus, filling a stadium with tens of thousands of onlookers is possible. At our level, most crowds are almost entirely made up of students, parents and alumni. In some places, the townsfolk take an interest too, and nowhere is that all more prevalent in Division III than in Collegeville, Minn., where the Johnnies took the attendance title yet again.

10 biggest regular-season crowds of '08:
1. Gustavus Adolphus at St. John’s, Sept. 27: 11,907
2. DePauw at Wabash, Nov. 15: 11,423
3. UW-La Crosse at UW-Whitewater, Oct. 4: 11,028
4. Ithaca at Cortland State, Nov. 15: 10,300
5. Concordia-Moorhead at St. John’s, Sept. 20: 9,436
6. Hamline at St. John’s, Oct. 11: 9,069
7. East Texas Baptist at St. John’s, Sept. 6: 7,963
8. St. John’s at St. Thomas, Oct. 18: 7,711
9. Hardin-Simmons at Mary Hardin-Baylor, Oct. 4: 7,522
10. Williams at Amherst, Nov. 8: 7,326
Source: NCAA

The Stagg Bowl crowd of 5,344 wouldn’t come close to making this list, and that was pairing two teams whose fans were familiar with Salem from the previous three seasons. By hosting every other playoff game on campus, and organizing the brackets geographically, Division III does the best it can to ensure solid attendance. But our game isn’t really for the masses. Think of it as an acquired taste.

Remember to put that Division III education to good use
In the NFL, Phil Savage (Sewanee), Eric Mangini (Wesleyan) and Rod Marinelli (Cal Lutheran) were fired. Steve Spagnuolo (Springfield) and Jeff Jagodzinski (UW-Whitewater) were coveted as replacements and Roger Goodell (Washington & Jefferson) still presided over the league. Oh, and some guy named Barack Obama became president-elect. Though he was not a football player, Obama did some undergrad work at Occidental, and ostensibly attended a game once.

Remember the odd occurrences
From Gordon Mann:
Hoosier Daddy? Wheaton. The Ilinois-based Thunder are the unofficial champs of Indiana after beating Trine, Wabash and Franklin in the playoffs.

From Ryan Tipps:
Coach Mike Clark played against coach Mike Clark in Week 4 when Bridgewater and Lycoming met.

From St. Thomas SID Gene McGivern:
St. Thomas and Carleton each won three homecoming games (their
own, and two on foes’ turf.

St. Thomas claimed the mythical Ramsey County Division III championship by
posting a combined 4-0 mark against the other four teams from their county --
Macalester, Hamline, Bethel and Northwestern.

Says McGivern, "The plan is in place: this year, the county; next year, the state; and in 2010, infinity and beyond."

Remember that it’s a small world
Working for D3football.com won’t make you rich or famous. But from time to time, there are weird byproducts of what we do. Around the West’s Adam Johnson reported getting recognized in a restaurant from his column mugshot, for example.

I had three small-world moments in late December.

A co-worker of mine at The Washington Post returned from vacation and said he had watched a UCLA-Wyoming basketball game with a family friend, who he identified by his Post Patterns board moniker. Later, another co-worker returned from a holiday trip home to Vermont, where he ran into Around the Norheast columnist Tom Haley in the mall. In between, a poker buddy of mine showed a house in Leesburg, Va., to a Mount Union grad who was a big fan of D3football.com.

Add that to three people actually inquiring about when Part 2 of the year-in-review would be published, and I feel extra important!

Remember how you hate to wait
Players get antsy as the season approaches, and fans aren’t far behind. For Christopher Newport, this season began with an excruciating delay after remnants of Tropical Storm Hanna forced the coastal Captains to cancel a Sept. 6 game against Wesley.

Coach Matt Kelchner’s team waited 39 days between the start of game and its first game, at Salisbury, on Sept. 20 (Week 3):

Kelchner and his staff tried everything they could think during the 39 days from pushing the team hard through game-like conditions to scaling back so as to not wear everyone out. Nothing worked.

"The team probably hit the wall about a week, week and a half ago," Kelchner said after the 38-21 loss to the Sea Gulls.

"It made me think of those teams who have to practice for 50 days leading up to their BCS bowl game," Kelchner said. "We tried to go hard, go easy, scrimmage, not scrimmage. It didn’t matter."

Luckily, the missing game didn’t cost CNU, which earned the USAC’s AQ, or Wesley, which got in via Pool B, a playoff spot. But seeded No. 6 and No. 7 in the Millsaps Bracket, each team probably could’ve used the win to bolster its resume.

Remember the heart of a Division III player
D3sports.com’s Gordon Mann covered Delaware Valley’s 25-22 upset of then-No. 3 Wesley early in the season. This stood out to him weeks later:

"This weekend, the Aggies were trailing Wesley, 22-17, with 4:35 left when they started their last drive. During the drive, Aggies center Rob Shedlosky was injured and came out of the game. It was later reported that he had cramps, which was not unusual on a humid day in Doylestown, Pa.

Sophomore Jim McKay came into the game and did a nice job on shotgun snaps, which are critical to the Aggies’ offense. Delaware Valley quarterback Mike Isgro is only 5-10 and needs the space to move around the pocket. With 16 seconds left in the game, the Aggies had a fourth-and-goal on the Wesley 1-yard line. They called timeout and brought Shedlosky back into the game. He helped get just enough of a push so Butch Whiteside could score the game-winning touchdown.

As the Aggies celebrated, Shedlosky laid flat on the ground. He tried to walk to the sideline but couldn’t so they brought the ambulance on the field. He had cramps in both arms and legs from dehydration so the paramedics took him to the hospital for an IV. As the ambulance was pulling off the field, the teammates on the sideline and fans in the stands cheered him. A couple hours after the game, I saw him in a mostly empty parking lot walking around, shaking hands and apparently feeling better."

ATN got a heads-up from a Springfield fan who told us of a fellow man who exemplified what a Division III supporter should be. He’d come down with a terminal illness, and died during the season. We never were able to share his story with our audience, something ATN regrets.

Remember the worst moments
Injuries always stand out among the things we wish never happened, and to anyone who suffered one and didn’t heal quickly, we feel for you. But by the same token, everyone who steps on a football field knows they are putting their body at risk.

The moments that really make us cringe are the ones where members of our Division – the slightly holier-than-thou group that brags about being able to take finals and support a playoff system and still graduate most everyone – exhibits poor judgment. Luckily, ATN could only come up with one lowlight that made it into the spotlight this season:

Among seven people arrested after a Saturday night fight outside a bar were five Salisbury football players, including three defensive starters and a fourth who rotated in. More here, about halfway down the page.

Remember the biggest disputes
There are moments in every season where complaints arise, over officiating, sportsmanship or something the NCAA supposedly did or did not do. It’s par for the course. Whether these moments deserved all the discussion they got or not, here are 2008’s most-talked about "controversies:"

Trailing 12-10 at the half of a national semifinal against UW-Whitewater and kicking off into a south wind estimated at 25-30 mph, Mary Hardin-Baylor felt its season was blown away. Alan Munoz’s kickoff traveled normally until it was above the 50-yard line, before the strength of the wind caught the ball in midair and blew it backward. After a scramble, the Crusaders recovered at their own 24, six yards behind where the ball was teed up.

Officials from the SCIAC ruled the ball hit the ground at the 38, less than 10 yards from the 30, meaning UMHB’s first touch was akin to touching an onside kick before it had traveled 10 yards. UW-Whitewater was given possession at the 24, and scored on the next play on the way to a 39-13 victory and the Stagg Bowl.

Video replays showed the ball first touching at the 41, 11 yards from where it was kicked, meaning UMHB’s first touch was not illegal and the Crusaders should have been awarded possession when they recovered the loose ball.

The play was clearly a momentum changer – not to mention just plain strange. The Warhawks had scored right before the half to take the lead, and UMHB never really recovered. Some thought the ruling cost the Crusaders the game, but most people figured one play in a 39-13 game wouldn’t have altered the outcome. Days after the game, UMHB coach Pete Fredenburg was using the incident to campaign for instant replay at semifinals, something NCAA officials seemed to support as far back as quarterfinal games, if the money for camera angles and review staff could be produced.

Much was made about Mount Union being the No. 1 seed in the playoff bracket where all the East Region teams ended up. Sometimes it was discussed as Mount Union being "moved to the East," such as here, on Post Patterns’ 2008 Playoff Thread. In reality, there are no East, West, North and South brackets, just four brackets built with geography (as it relates to limiting airplane flights on the NCAA’s dime) in mind.

Far too much was made of this, especially since the four No. 1 seeds, despite three of them eventually being eliminated in the second round, had regular-season resumes better than the best East Region team.

The playoff selection committee over the past two seasons has taken into account an old Year-in-Review complaint, that brackets should be built around the strongest No. 1 seeds possible. Although they’ve hit it on the head as far as ATN is concerned, they can’t please all of the fans all of the time.

For a concise dissenting viewpoint, I lean on TGP, from the year-in-review thread on Post Patterns:

"If the Chair of the NCAA will go on the record saying that there are no regions, but 4 top seeds and pools 1, 2, 3, and 4, then we should go ahead and dispel this b.s. of there being an East, North, South and West Region.

Although geographically correct, there is no validity of regions being considered (other than avoiding travel costs by the NCAA), as part of the championship format - which is what the regular season is about setting up in the first place."

Remember there’s more than one way to view the Division III powers
Gordon Mann wrote a very well-received post on the East Region Playoff Discussion thread, in the midst of a discussion on a topic that had started a few pages before, comparing the strength of different regions and the top teams in them.

Posted just before this year’s semifinals, here’s Gordon Mann’s tier theory:

"[T]here are essentially three tiers of playoff teams.

Tier I has the elite few who are national championship contenders. Tier I could lose to Tier II, but it only happens very rarely (and even less rarely in the playoffs). In most cases Tier I beats Tier II by 14+ points. Tier I doesn't lose to Tier III.

Tier II has the great teams who will go a couple rounds, depending on the matchup. Sometimes Tier II teams play each other in the early rounds. Tier II could beat a Tier I team if they play a tremendous game and Tier I plays poorly. In most cases Tier II beats Tier III by 14+ points but could lose in an upset.

Tier III is everyone else who makes the playoffs. Throw in the teams that just miss the playoffs in here, too, if you want. They are contenders to make the playoffs and they might beat a Tier II team, but probably not more than one in the same playoff. And they definitely don't beat Tier I.

The trick is naming who is in each tier. Before the season started, I would've put four teams in Tier I - Mount Union, Whitewater, UMHB and Wesley. In retrospect three of them still fit.

The litmus test between Tier II and Tier III is whether you could ever envision the team beating someone in Tier I. Would Curry ever beat Mount Union? Would Aurora ever beat Whitewater? If not, then they are Tier III.

Tier II includes Wheaton, Hardin Simmons, Cortland, Ithaca, etc. Tier III includes Curry (upsets Tier II Ithaca), Plymouth State, Lycoming, etc.

In this theory, Wheaton could beat Mount Union if everything breaks right, but wouldn't beat UW-Whitewater or Mary Hardin-Baylor in the Stagg Bowl.

And the teams within those Tiers can change over time. Linfield was in Tier I a couple years ago and now is Tier III. Same goes for Rowan.

Just a theory to play with."

Remember how hard it is to crash through the glass ceiling
Not just this year, but over the course of several, history seems to repeat itself. In Division III, it’s not just all of us failing to beat Mount Union more often than not. There are several "glass ceilings" that teams can see through, but can’t pass through.

With a run in this season’s playoffs, Wheaton extended its all-time NCAA playoff mark to 9-6. Perhaps even more fortunate, the runners up in the North Region’s CCIW avoided being placed in a bracket with national powerhouse Mount Union, whose bracket was filled six East Region teams and one from the South.

The No. 7-seeded Thunder beat Trine, Wabash and Franklin to win the North Central Bracket, but still met the same fate as their teams did in 1995, 2002-04 and 2006: Though it was deeper in the postseason than it had ever been before, Mount Union again ended Wheaton’s run. The Thunder and has never been eliminated by a team other than the Purple Raiders, against whom they are 9-0.

As Mount Union and UW-Whitewater have dominated the past few seasons, Mary Hardin-Baylor and Wesley have emerged as the next-best in the group. What’s kept them both from rising to the top are their results against UW-Whitewater.

UMHB, in particular, has had four cracks at the Warhawks. Twice in a home-and-home regular-season series in 2006-07, and twice in the playoffs, in 2007-08.

Two games in Whitewater, two games in Belton.
Two were in the regular season, two were in the national semifinals.
Two were close, two were not.
All four were won by UW-Whitewater.

Oct. 28, 2006: UW-W 7, at UMHB 3
Oct. 27, 2007: at UW-W 41, UMHB 14
Dec. 8, 2007: at UW-W 16, UMHB 7
Dec. 13, 2008: UW-W 39, at UMHB 13

Further down the list, UHMB acts as someone else’s glass ceiling. In the often-maligned "Texas sub-bracket," in which playoff teams from that state have to play each other in the first round because no opponents are in bus-trip distance, Hardin-Simmons or Trinity (Texas) have accompanied UMHB to the playoffs the past five seasons, and have hit the wall against the Cru.

The Cowboys and Tigers might well be teams capable of making runs a few rounds into the playoffs if they didn’t have to match up with another power program so soon. But as long as cost constrictions force the sub-bracket, we’ll never know.

2004 first round: UMHB 32, Trinity 13
2004 second round: UMHB 42, HSU 28
2005 first round: UMHB 35, Trinity 6
2006 first round: UMHB 33, HSU 21
2007 first round: UMHB 52, Trinity 23
2008 first round: UMHB 38, HSU 35

There’s another "island" of Division III football West of the Rockies. (If you’ve never read our Daily Dose post on the subject, or this discussion thread and map, check them out). Fourteen of the 239 Division III teams are in the Pacific Time Zone, and Colorado College is the only one on Mountain Time. Combined, they make up just 6% of the football-playing schools in Division III.

Consequently, the champion of the SCIAC often has to play the champion of the NWC in the first round, even when the committee wishes they wouldn’t. This season, the committee wanted No. 7 Wartburg to go to No. 2 Occidental and No. 8 Aurora to go to No. 1 Willamette in one of the playoff brackets, but cost-containment measures matched the Tigers and Bearcats up in the first round. Some reward Occidental gets for going undefeated, a road game against the top seed in its bracket.

This also happened to 9-0 Tigers teams in 2006 and 2005. Both lost on the road. In 2004, Occidental went 8-1, got a home game against NWC runner-up Willamette and won twice before losing to eventual national champion Linfield.

In 2007, SCIAC champ Redlands avoided a road game at the NWC champ only became no team from that conference made the field. The Bulldogs lost 41-13 at St. John’s.

Remember to give the committee its due
We’re always giving heck to our selection committee, made up of four coaches and four administrators, balanced over the four regions. But they’re not nameless, faceless NCAA droids deserving of our ire. They’re Division III folks volunteering their time to get it as close to right as possible, with the help of the playoff handbook. There are always things to like and dislike about the 32-team field. From Nov. 20’s ATN:

The committee nailed
The No. 1 seeds. The move of Mount Union to a bracket filled with mostly East Region teams was imperative given Cortland State and Muhlenberg's losses in Week 11. North Central, Willamette and Millsaps were all deserving of top seeds. To make one of them a No. 2 to keep the Purple Raiders in their home region doesn't serve any worthwhile purpose.

The committee blew
They didn't have a choice with the Texas rematch and were overruled on using two flights for West Coast teams. But providing the No. 1 Willamette/No. 2 Occidental winner with a potential visit from the defending national champion adds to the indignity. Unless of course you subscribe to the 'you'd have to beat them sooner or later' theory.

Next year, we should do this again
For as much as we gripe, there are a lot of things about the season and the playoffs that we like, such as the AQ system and the semifinal video webcasts. Also, ATN needs to say some nice things before we bombard the decision-makers with suggestions.

The four most deserving playoff teams should continue to be No. 1 seeds in the playoffs, regardless of region affiliation, so long as brackets can be built around all four within 500-mile radii. And keep pushing for the money to be able to fly a second or third team in the first round; your constituency appreciates it.

Next year this should be done differently
As much as we like things the way they are, D3football.com gets around enough during the season that it's practically our duty to circulate the best ideas for improving things. Here are the most wise suggestions for ways to better the Division III football landscape:

We might never stop pleading for this, but then again, it’s our job not to. Division III has such a good system for opening access to the playoffs, and in theory the championship, to every team that we wonder why Division I-A struggles to find something that works. Our system has the potential to be nearly flawless, yet it isn’t.

If the selection committee could get approval to pay for one to three more teams to fly in the first round (all trips of 500 miles or more require paid-for plane trips), they could make first-round matchups in the four playoff brackets according to the properly assigned seeds.

In this year’s brackets, East and North teams played the seeds they earned. In the South and West, it’s always a different story. What was unique this year is that our publisher, Pat Coleman, in his role as selection show commentator for ESPN, was forwarded a bracket featuring two first-round flights out West. In the end, Aurora played in its home state against Monmouth instead of flying to Oregon, and Wartburg went to Wisconsin instead of California. The selection committee’s hearts are in the right place, but Division III’s pockets aren’t deep enough. Perhaps we should take up a small collection at all home games for the "first-round flight fund."

We’ll likely see a playoff roster expansion to 58 players from 52 first, but giving the West Coast and Texas teams the right to play as the seed they’ve earned is the last major obstacle to being able to say Division III has created the ultimate college football playoff.

ATN would like to see us move toward webcasting all playoff games, not just the semifinals. And while we’re at it, it would be nice if a standard video format and browser emerged, so those who follow more than one team weren’t constantly downloading whatever software is needed to checkout game action and live stats. There’s too much variation in the navigation of getting to the game you want to watch, the quality of the video and whether it's live or can be paused and the available bandwidth. We applaud the progress, but ask for more.

If the above ever becomes a reality, we’d prefer to no longer start every playoff game at noon local. Although it makes for easy-peasy planning, and there are no national broadcast schedules to work around, simultaneous kickoffs are fine. But the ability to watch more than one game a day might be good for exposure, especially during the playoffs. Of the 16 first-round games, kicking four at noon EST, four at 3, four at 6 and the westernmost ones at 9 might not be possible because the lack of lights at many Division III fields, but staggered starts would be a nice option.

Each year it seems a fan of a team getting ready to face Mount Union in the playoffs joins the discussion and slanders the Purple Raiders. That people root against a winner is no surprise; we all love the underdog. But that one fan comes at it from such an uninformed angle in such a crass way, that it usually reflects poorly on the school he roots for and their fans.

The good news is that regular D3football.com posters are used to it, and usually by season’s end, the loudmouth has morphed into a fan who contributes insight to the discourse. But we’d be fine if next year we didn’t have to go through all the 'move up to Division II’ and 'they don’t care about their players’ futures’ jazz just to reach that point.

Wesley and Salisbury should join the "Empire 6" as football-only affiliates, to give the Route 13 rivals a league, and to preserve the powerful Empire 8’s AQ. Travel-wise, it would probably make more sense for them to join the NJAC and have the New York schools in the NJAC become football-only E8 affiliates, but there’s a lot more to those moves than meets the eye. They might not be as possible, especially when all sports are considered, as they seem.

But just for fun, let’s imagine Wesley and Salisbury join a conference immediately and are eligible to compete for a title and playoff spot out of the gate. Frostburg State could become the PAC’s 10th team, and the disbanding of the ACFC would leave Newport News Apprentice, which isn’t actually a Division III school, competing as an independent.

Lycoming and Rowan finally scheduled each other, albeit several years after it would have been an ultra-relevant clash of East powers.

Everyone else, no need to wait. Here are ATN’s suggestions for matchups that need to happen ASAP:

1. Wabash vs. Case Western Reserve: Rematch of first-round playoff game might become a reality under NCAC-UAA scheduling agreement.
2. RPI vs. Curry: Both teams are annually one tough nonconference game short.
3. UW-Whitewater should fill Mount Union’s lone non-conference opening after the St. John Fisher contract is up in 2009.

Remember which team will play the role of Franklin in 2009
Gordon Mann figured it out: "Last year, Franklin had a heartbreaking loss to North Central in the first round of the playoffs, when the Cardinals scored in the closing seconds. Given the HCAC’s lack of playoff success, I was surprised Franklin hung that close to North Central but the Grizzlies showed they were for real. Then-junior Chad Rupp threw for 400 yards.

Consider the parallels between 2007 Franklin and 2008 Monmouth. The Scots, champions of a conference without much playoff success, lost in the closing seconds to Wartburg. Their quarterback (Alex Tanney) had a big game in defeat with 313 yards and three touchdowns. He'll be back. And, if the parallel holds up, so will Monmouth."

Remember who to vote for as preseason No. 1 in 2009
Mount Union returns 14 players who started in the Stagg Bowl victory, but graduate the most-efficient passer in NCAA history in Greg Micheli and the leading rusher in NCAA history in Nate Kmic. UW-Whitewater goes a step further, returning 10 starters on defense (graduating D3football.com defensive player of the year Jace Rindahl) and nine on offense (including all of the starting skill position players and both of the 1,000-yard running backs.

Here's an off-the-top possible top 5 for next season (seriously, I did this in about 15 seconds):

1. UW-Whitewater
2. Mount Union
3. Mary Hardin-Baylor
4. Willamette
5. Wartburg

Covered in Part 1 on Dec. 20: Great games, plays, statistics, players and coaches

Contributing: Gordon Mann, Ryan Tipps, Pat Coleman, D3sports.com photographers, D3football.com readers