The connection between Pella, Iowa, and Thousand Oaks, California, would seem to require a signifcant commute, but Central made its way to Cal Lutheran for a game that had a different look than most non-conference schedules. Photo by Dan L. Vander Beek for Central athletics

By Greg Thomas
D3sports.com

THOUSAND OAKS, Calif. — Schedules. Football players and football coaches crave them. They are masters of routine and the discipline of schedules is foundational for their success. Why then is it sometimes so difficult for football teams to fill a ten-game schedule?

Threading the needle through the labyrinth of budgets, mutual interest, institutional priorities, and common open dates — to name just a few constraints teams must deal with — is tricky as it turns out. But when agreements do get made for long distance games, such as the Week 2 matchup between Cal Lutheran and Central, they can often result in great student-athlete experiences. 

Fortunately, for most of Division III, most of the season’s 10-game schedule is taken care of through conference play. Or all 10 games if you’re a member of the Presidents’ Athletic Conference, or nine for the New England Small College Athletic Conference. For the rest, there are some early open Saturdays to fill with non-conference games. These games are opportunities to compete against like-minded schools, or teams with a similar competitive profile, or chances to boost a team’s strength of schedule to amplify their appeal for possible playoff selection or seeding. 

At Cal Lutheran in Thousand Oaks, California, there aren’t many nearby options and filling a season’s schedule has recently become more difficult with Occidental and Whittier dropping football. The Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference has moved to a conference schedule which has its teams playing two conference members twice, and a third conference rematch in a Week 11 crossover game. The league also regularly partners with the Northwest Conference for a week of non-conference games (in Week 3, all six SCIAC teams are in action against NWC teams). That leaves Cal Lutheran and their counterparts in the SCIAC with one additional game to fill. 

In recent years, the Kingsmen have traveled to Wisconsin (UW-Stout) and to Texas (Southwestern) to play non-conference games. Coach Anthony Lugo embraces the opportunities for long trips.

“I think It's great in the sense of giving our student-athletes a great experience to get them out to Wisconsin or to get out to Texas,” Lugo said. “It's kind of the makeup of D-III to give the student-athletes a great experience, to get them out of their comfort zone at times and we like a big trip to build that team camaraderie and we've been very lucky when we come back from those big trips the team seems a little bit tighter and those bonds are a little bit tighter. It's a good getaway so we try to plan for those trips every year.”

Cal Lutheran hosted Central in Week 2 and Dutch coach Jeff McMartin echoed the value of the long trip for his student-athletes. “Few things in life are static. You're always having to be adaptable,” McMartin said. “You're always having to have a mind that things don't always go the way you want them to. So this trip is a good opportunity to build that into the mindset of our players. Like we might get stuck in traffic, or we might have a delay in the airport and we're going to have to be adaptable to that, because we want them to be adaptable on Saturdays. We want to be adaptable to the game. So this is a really good opportunity to kind of work on some of those things off the field that hopefully translate.”

This year, Cal Lutheran’s travel schedule is a little lighter as the Kingsmen hosted Central in Week 2 and will host their traditional NWC rival Pacific Lutheran this week. When they are ready to hit the road again, Cal Lutheran will be pursuing games with similar institutions. “I'm pretty lucky here at Cal Lutheran. The university really pushes us to find those games that fit us,” Lugo said. “We would be open to going back east or to the mid-Atlantic. We’ve been very lucky to stay in that Midwest range and down in Texas. I think it's a testament to the university that lets us take big trips like that.”

McMartin also made a note of institutional preferences for playing institutions. “You want to find like-minded institutions, places and people that kind of look and feel like you,” McMartin said. “You're going to get a good game that way, too. And the sportsmanship here and how these guys played, I mean, it's what college football should look like every Saturday.”

Central’s trip to California was made possible not by ballooning department budgets, but in part due to Central players and coaches putting in their own sweat equity to make the experience possible. “We have a food stand at our Tulip Time Festival,” McMartin said referencing an annual Pella, Iowa festival celebrating Dutch heritage. “So we sell steak sandwiches and barbecued pork and brats and the money that we make goes to different activities like this. So we, we fundraise for this and we all, we all work at it, coaches and players. That in itself is pretty fun, and then to be able to utilize those funds to do something like this is really cool.”

While games like Central and Cal Lutheran came together fairly easily, there are plenty of Division III teams that struggle to put together 10-game schedules. Even McMartin acknowledges the difficulty. “Most Division III coaches will tell you that finding non-conference games is a real challenge. The pathway to the playoffs, I think that that's part of it. Obviously, budgets are part of it. And then, every team kind of has their own philosophy and agenda, and so you've got to find another team that feels a little bit the way that you do about traveling or playing home and away and that kind of thing.”

Lake Forest coach Jim Catanzaro has generally had good luck in finding non-conference opponents, but noted that it can be difficult even in a Division III-rich area, especially when the Foresters are at or near the top of their conference as they have been in recent years. “Sometimes its very difficult, other times not very difficult,” Catanzaro told Around the Nation. “I actually think the thing that makes it harder is when you're winning football games. Ten years ago, people were happy to schedule Lake Forest. After a good couple of years of runs in the last three to four years, it got a lot harder to find willing dance partners.

“I think that 1-0 in Week 1 is really important to a lot of coaches,” Catanzaro continued. “It can really change your season.”

A sentiment shared by Lugo, McMartin, and Catanzaro is the desire to ideally schedule non-conference opponents of similar competitive levels. Teams want to be challenged and want to challenge opponents, but in a winnable scenario. Sometimes schedule agreements that look competitive at the time become less so by the time the games come around, but that uncertainty can rarely go away. 

The preferences by teams to play teams of similar caliber may help explain the recent trend of increasing Top 25 matchups in September over the last couple of years. After all, even the top 10 or 15 teams have to play somebody, don’t they? It only makes sense that teams like St. John’s and UW-River Falls or Wheaton and UW-Oshkosh would start to find each other eventually. 

In previous years, coaches could try, with some of that uncertainty mentioned earlier, to schedule games (within their own institutional or departmental constraints) that could boost their playoff profile. Angling for opponents that might provide a boost to the NCAA’s strength of schedule calculation or opponents that might be regionally ranked. Under the new NCAA Power Index (NPI) driven selection and seeding process, it’s difficult for coaches to make decisions with the new process in mind. 

“It sounds to me like the most important thing is you’ve got to win the games,” Catanzaro said. “So winning or what's the other option, so to speak, if you lose to a good opponent, is that really going to help you? So I think that’s the hardest part until we see how the dials (the NPI weights for variables related to win percentage and strength of schedule) play out. I don't know how much that's going to affect decision making for me just yet.”

McMartin is optimistic that the other major change to the postseason — expansion to 40 teams — will create more opportunity for non-conference scheduling by reducing the risk of taking a big challenge. “I'm hopeful that it'll be a little bit easier to schedule some non-conference games and say, if we win or lose, we still have got a chance.”

Who Are Those Guys?

Really long time ATN readers might recognize this segment from Keith McMillan’s columns that tracked Division III vs. non-Division III results. I won’t be giving a full accounting of those results here, but resurrecting this segment is helpful to acknowledge those in the Division that do have significant trouble finding ten Division III opponents, or even 10 games at all. 

In Week 2, three teams in the Top 25 played non-Division III opponents and 10 teams in total on the D3football.com scoreboard played out of division opponents — which does not count Mary Hardin-Baylor or Millsaps who each played games against non-countable competition. Around the Nation doesn’t have all the answers — every institution has its own restrictions and priorities that should be respected- but there are great experiences to be had by student-athletes to play in venues like Crusader Stadium in Belton, Texas, or the Pine Bowl in Spokane, Washington, or Perkins Stadium in Whitewater, Wisconsin. Hosting highly ranked teams from other regions of the country can also be a great experience for a campus for schools that will agree to home and homes. 

With an increased emphasis on in-division play in the NCAA Power Index, Around the Nation hopes to see fewer Nelsons and more intriguing interregional games between Division III teams on the early season schedules. 

By the way, D-III went 7-3 in those ten games vs. non-division opponents in Week 2. 

Seven Ways to Saturday 

Whether you need to recap the week that was or get ready for the week to come, D3football.com is your daily source for fresh Division III football content. We’re bringing the content seven ways to Saturday. 

Sunday: New Top 25 Poll

Monday: Around The Nation podcast. Pat Coleman and Greg Thomas recap the weekend that was and preview the weekend to come in Division III football.

Tuesday: Team of the Week Honors

Wednesday: Features columns

Thursday: Around The Nation Column

Friday: Quick Hits featuring our panel’s predictions and insights into the weekend’s games

Saturday: Game Day! The D3football.com Scoreboard has all of your links for stats and broadcasts. 

I’d Like to Thank…

Special thanks to Anthony Lugo, Jeff McMartin, and Jim Catanzaro for spending time with Around The Nation this week. Additional thanks to Cal Lutheran Director of Sports Information Kieran Cantwell, Central College Athletics Communications Director Joe Flaherty, and Lake Forest College Sports Information Director Mike Wajerski for coordinating our conversations this week!

Read options?

There’s nothing small about small college football. Division III is home to 240 teams, and many thousands of student-athletes and coaches. There are so many more stories out there than I can find on my own. Please share your stories that make Division III football so special for all of us! Reach out to me at greg.thomas@d3sports.com or on Twitter @wallywabash to share your stories.