Craig Sabb and Tyjarek Simmons are among five juniors who hope to have a chance to compete in the Division III NCAA Tournament before they leave Pfeiffer. Photo by Dave Hilbert, d3photography.com

By Ryan Scott
D3sports.com

Division III is already the largest in the NCAA, but the philosophy focused on academics and keeping the “student” first in student-athlete remains attractive to schools all over the country. At the most recent NCAA Convention, new legislation was approved to shorten the transition time from five years to four years for schools wishing to enter Division III from outside the NCAA, or three years for those coming from other divisions.

We can see the process from the outside as new names pop up on schedules and scoreboards, but what that process looks like on campus remains a mystery to most Division III basketball fans. It’s something worth brushing up on, as the new legislation certainly makes the transition process less daunting and more attractive; there’s a good chance we’ll see increasing numbers of interested schools in the years ahead.

“It’s so much more attractive now,” says Pfeiffer athletic director Danielle Lafferty, whose school is in its final year of the old, longer process. “A five-year transition means an entire class of student-athletes never gets to compete for championships.”

You can hear the fatigue in the voices of Lafferty and others, as they speak about what the process has meant for the campus. “Overall, for the University, it’s been a tremendous success,” says Lafferty. “We had our two largest enrollment increases in the first two years of transition.”

Much of that can be attributed to the ability for Pfeiffer to transfer its athletic scholarship funds into general scholarships, making the school more attractive to students across the board. Pfeiffer honored their athletic scholarships through graduation, but they were without any scholarship athletes by the end of Year 2 of the transition.

The new legislation essentially eliminated Year 3 of the process – a year some schools have successfully petitioned to bypass under the old system. It also allows NCAA institutions to skip the exploratory year – a nebulous introductory season in which the transitioning team remains fully eligible in their previous location while they seek out a Division III conference and make sure their institution can handle the required changes for Division III membership.

Brina Bentley, a junior, leads Pfeiffer in scoring. Four of Pfeiffer's top scorers in women's basketball are juniors. Photo by Dave Hilbert, d3photography.com

“We were already a Division II school,” notes Lafferty. “We had to get used to a new philosophy and different compliance rules, but we were well-versed in the NCAA and what it means to be an NCAA institution.”

Pfeiffer made the transition for a confluence of two reasons: a need to increase overall enrollment and an inability to fund the athletic department to be competitive in Division II. “We had four scholarships in a league that allowed 10,” says women’s basketball coach, Tooey Loy, who was also involved when High Point transitioned from Division II to Division I in the 1990s. “You’re at a huge disadvantage just getting off the bus.”

Loy explained that many Division II schools choose to expand their non-scholarship rosters to pay for the maximum allowed scholarships. “I’ve seen basketball teams with 45 on the roster, baseball teams with 100; I would not have been comfortable going in that direction. It’s not what’s best for your players.”

The Falcons will be competing on an even playing field in Division III and this transition has expanded opportunities for student athletes. “Our athletes can be nursing majors,” says Lafferty. “They can participate in travel programs in non-traditional seasons. The faculty have loved having more flexibility for students.”

Transition to Division III involves a lot of paperwork and reports. Lafferty said the first two years were consumed with monitoring financial aid, managing sports sponsorship, and tracking academics, but the most difficult part of the transition certainly fell on coaches, who had to adjust to a completely different approach in Division III.

“Division II makes serious demands on [student-athletes’] time the moment they walk onto campus,” says men’s basketball coach, Pete Schoch. “We’re used to having time with them in the summers and out of season. We’re used to knowing who we’ll have and exactly what they can do well before the season starts… not anymore!”

Loy adds: “This is the toughest job I’ve ever had! Time management is so important at the Division III level; I have so much more respect for Division III coaches now. By Oct. 15 there’s just not much time to get everything done before games start. It might take until January or February before you’re running a new offense well. You have to rely so much on your upperclassmen.”

Recruiting during the transition process is also difficult. Being ineligible for NCAA postseason play is often used against a team in transition on the recruiting trail. “You’re going to get a lot more recruiting disappointments at this level,” says Loy, but he also notes that this transition has been easier on recruiting than his prior move from Division II to Division I. “You’re going to get your best players in April and May when scholarship offers they might have been waiting for don’t pan out, but there’s a lot more flexibility for when you can go out and recruit.”

Most of the coaches were willing to stick it out and get on board when Pfeiffer announced the transition. Some have moved on during the transition process, but everyone seemed to agree it was largely regular turnover over a five-year period.

“The announcement [of transition] came right before a game,” says Schoch, who was an assistant at the time. “Coach [Jeremy] Currier gathered the guys and said, ‘I understand if you want to go somewhere else, but you need to decide soon so we can move forward.” Many of those players stuck around and the men’s basketball team was able to qualify for the NCAA Tournament in the school’s exploratory year, just before they became ineligible.

Currier himself left after the 2017-18 season to go to another Division II school, and Schoch was promoted.

Student-athletes who stayed on were able to continue their scholarships – which helped the teams competitively in the first season – and Pfeiffer was able to gain admission to the ECAC, which has provided some postseason opportunities during the transition. “It was a great goal for us the first year,” says Loy, “but we’re ready to be competing for conference titles and the NCAA tournament again.”

The long wait for Pfeiffer is almost over and it will be a shorter process for the next group of schools navigating transition. “It’s a well-intentioned process,” says Schoch, “but it has drug on a bit longer than we would’ve liked.”

This is precisely why Pfeiffer and the USA South Athletic Conference were instrumental in pushing the changes through. Ultimately it’s about the student-athlete experience. Compliance and philosophical changes do take time, but probably not five years, and once the scholarship athletes have cycled out, there’s no reason to drag the process on.

There was some serious education required for alumni who often see a move from Division II to Division III as a downgrade, but in Pfeiffer’s case it has all been positive. Schoch notes: “From an overall health perspective for the university, it’s been great. Academics are a real priority and students understand that they really do matter. Our roster now is full of a wide variety of majors, some of them demanding a lot of time. There’s great support from the conference and other coaches as well.”

“Besides,” says Loy, “Once the ball goes up, there’s no difference between Division III and Division I. It’s just basketball.”