Scary!

[50's PONY]

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
HoustonChronicle.com -- http://www.HoustonChronicle.com | Section: Sports

May 7, 2004, 11:33PM



Rice should take note of Trinity's peace of mind
By JOHN P. LOPEZ
Copyright 2004 Houston Chronicle
SAN ANTONIO -- Walk across the campus and you begin to think the red stone walls should be covered with ivy.

The campus sits elegantly and comfortably within shouting distance of urban sprawl, but you wouldn't know there was bustle nearby.

Long shadows crawl across footpaths and park benches. It's like a soothing blanket was thrown over campus.

Nearby, inner-city A-frames rim these 100-plus acres of academia. But this place is seemingly a million miles away from it all, insulated by its own grandeur.

A bell tower sounds the hour. A young woman bikes along a street lined with Colonial-style homes. Twigs crackle under a jogger's feet as he runs along a trail that winds around the intramural fields. At the baseball stadium, the constant ting of an aluminum bat slices through the air.

This place is so august and elegant. It could be Rice University. Or perhaps Rice's future.

Time will tell what will happen to Rice's athletic programs. Leave them alone? Drop from Division I-A football? Drop all sports to Division III?

Those are the questions.

There is one place where the third option was the answer. At Trinity University, they don't offer scholarships for athletics. But in nearly every other way, the similarities between it and Rice are striking.

From having similarly chic coffee houses, bookstores and movie houses on campus or close by, to even being near the busiest freeway in town, Rice and Trinity are alike.

Like Rice, Trinity is known for its academics. In a given year, some 30 National Merit Scholars are admitted into the university. There have been Fulbright Fellows, Rhodes Scholars and Mellon, Carnegie, Goldwater, Truman award winners. Virtually every academic honor or fellowship known has been awarded to Trinity students.

The number of undergraduate students (just under 2,700), average SAT scores of incoming students (1,300) and diversity of the student population (they hail from 48 states and 35 foreign countries) are strikingly similar to Rice's statistics.

Once upon a time, Trinity also played Division I sports in everything but football.

The Tigers won a national title at the Division I level in tennis in 1972 and advanced to the NCAA Division I baseball playoffs three times in five years from 1969-1973.

And Trinity produced a string of superb stars, particularly in tennis. Chuck McKinley, who won the 1963 Wimbledon singles title, came here. So did [deleted] Stockton, a finalist at Wimbledon and the French Open, and tennis stars Tony Giammalva, Brian Gottfried, Larry Gottfried and Frank Connor, who remains the only athlete to compete in the U.S. Open in both tennis and golf.

Marvin Upshaw, who won a Super Bowl ring with the Kansas City Chiefs, was known as the, "Maroon Mauler" while at Trinity. And Houston's Larry Jeffries, who played for the Detroit Pistons, was maybe the Tigers' biggest basketball star.

But the Trinity board of trustees made a tough, controversial decision. Some students protested. Alumni fussed.

In 1973, the board decided to drop Division I athletics in all sports except tennis. In 1990, tennis also dropped to Division III.

"It's very difficult to make that kind of transition because you have a certain culture and expectation level from your fan base," Trinity athletic director Bob King said. "Philosophically, it is a huge change.

"Even at Trinity to this day there are some people who wish we hadn't made that transition. But it was the best move for this university. Absolutely, no question about it."

Since figuring out, "who we are," as King put it, the Tigers have become one of the top Division III athletic programs in the nation.

The Tigers have won four NCAA Division III national titles since 2000. The most recent was the 2003 women's basketball title, a run that was keyed by Megan Selmon, the daughter of former University of Oklahoma football star Dewey Selmon.

When talking about why Division III fits a place like Trinity, Chris Ellertson, dean of admissions and financial aid, points to Selmon as proof that trying to remain at Division I would have been out of character.

"She was one of only six students (nationally) picked for the Woodrow Wilson Fellowship," Ellertson said. "She was a double major in international studies and Spanish. Her junior season, she was the conference player of the year and an academic All-American. But her senior year, she missed the first half of basketball season because she was studying abroad.

"When she returned, they wound up winning the national championship. This is what I love about Division III. I've worked Division I, and I know there's a mentality where there's a sense of ownership by coaches. If they offer that student a scholarship, they believe the athlete belongs to them. Here the coaches encourage them to study abroad. We've even had coaches change their practice schedules because a student had a lab."

Trinity finished fourth in the Division III all-sports standings a year ago. The Tigers have made it deep into national tournaments in football, basketball and soccer. And the level of talent is only marginally lower than what the Tigers once knew.

Lance Key, a former soccer player, is playing Major League Soccer. Jerheme Urban, a former wide receiver, is entering his second season with the Seattle Seahawks.

And as Ellertson said, "There is no special treatment of athletes. There is no special housing. There is no special dining hall. There's no special weight area. There are no special tutors."

The GPA of Trinity student-athletes actually is higher than the general student population. Athletes' graduation rate is about 90 percent.

"Philosophically, academically and in every other way the trustees felt the transition to Division III was in the best long-term interests of the university," King said. "It has been exactly that. We're really on a roll. We're exactly where we belong. We don't see (Division III) as negative. Everybody has to figure out who they are."

While Rice wrestles with tough decisions, Trinity basks in success.

"This was a long process," King said, "and it didn't come easy. But we've found our niche."

At Rice, only time will tell where the Owls will find theirs.



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------






HoustonChronicle.com -- http://www.HoustonChronicle.com | Section: Sports
This article is: http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/sports/2556770

[Sam I Am]

For a while in the 1950's Trinity tried to play BIG time football too. We played Ole Miss, Air Force Academy, TCU, A&M, when we could. I knew Chuck McKinley when he wa a freshman. I nearly cried when the Tigers dropped to Div. III. Now I couldn't be prouder. Their championship footall teams often have 120 players out for the sport. Div. III may be the model for amateur college athletics. Unless SMU makes a go of
Div. I-A, then our pony sports program should rop all the way to Div. III. The future of non-BCS schools is at stake.

Trinity 1960, SMU 1963, U.T. 1973

[StangEsq]

Problem is that 90% of the high school students in this state have never even HEARD of Trinity. Dropping into Division III athletics drops a school into virtual anonimity. No one should want that, no mater how bad the athletic programs are.

[Sam I Am]

Judging by the average SAT scores, apparently the smart students know about Trinity. By the way, the school was not an elite academic campus at the time they dropped to Div. III. If anything, the schools enrollment has grown slightly since their days of BIG time sports. Do I want SMU to grow that way? Sure! But I want it both ways, sort of like Stanford has done or Duke. The issue for SMU, like Rice, will be how much of a deficit will
Div. I-A cost the progam. If it gets up to $10 million like at Rice, then down we go to Div. III. Watch and see. Of course if Rice ever drops down, the C-USA will have to go poaching again. Guess the UNT crowd has an opinion about picking the bones of the Owls, right.

[Peruna_Ate_My_Rolex]

On a random note, Charles' son actually went to HS with me during my freshman year before he transferred to St. Mark's. Some of us had no idea his dad had won at Wimbledon until he took us into the school library and showed us a pic of him holding up his title. Small world.

[Sam I Am]

Attention: Peruna-ate-my-rolex, Chuck Mckinley married Wylita Baxter from Trinity. They separated later on. Was the McKinley boy at St. Mark's their son? I got to know Chuck's younger brother years later when he was a teaching pro in San Antonio. I do like our small world connections.