Alum Ben Wann (C’04), a four-year football player for the College and a former coach for the Upper School, asked what football supporters could aim for in terms of numbers.
A “soft number” is 40, Ellis said, although he isn’t sure “in the [Christian Science] movement where the numbers are for us.”
Junior Rob Terrell inquired if Principia could seek membership in other, smaller conferences, or if we could downgrade from Division III to Division IV.
Ellis answered that in National College Athletic Association (NCAA), Principia’s Division III athletics program could not have a separate Division IV section for football. He added that there would be “severe penalties for the rest of the program” if we kept the football program but opted out for a year.
There are other conference options besides the St. Louis Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (SLIAC), of which Principia is currently a member. Principia has arranged with the Upper Midwest Athletic Conference (UMAC) to be “grandfathered in,” meaning we would not need to apply.
However, Ellis said, he doesn’t think switching to a new conference would “change the dynamic at all.”
“I think we’ll be where we were,” Ellis said. Principia would need “a cadre of coaches” because of the “intricate positional play that the game requires.”
Freshman Zach Becker asked why the program had been shut down instead of competing with the current players. Palmer’s response was that they “don’t see anything new on the coaching front that we haven’t already considered,” and that they could not start fifteen months of discussion over.
“As much as you’d like to start it over, to me it’s been completed,” he said.
“I think this was an open process,” said Palmer. “I just don’t see any difference today than when we prepared the [Dec. 1 email] memo.”
Senior Martin Buchanan, whose fourth year of football would have been this season, had a series of questions for Ellis and Palmer. One concerned the logic behind phone calls made by Palmer to other colleges, requesting them to “take it easy” on our football team.
“I was thinking about what’s best for Principia,” said Palmer, “what’s best for our students generally.”
“Calling these other schools was part of our fiduciary responsibility,” replied Palmer. “I’m comfortable with the decision.”
Buchanan followed up with a question about the men’s basketball team, whose numbers are quite low and whose coaches he described as “not great.” Buchanan asked if the basketball program would be cut soon.
Ellis responded, “It would be unfair to treat them [football and basketball programs] equally. We look at each program individually … [and] there’s a different measure of looking at each particular sport.”
Alum Jason Grier (C’01), who played football for three years and coached at the Upper School, asked, “Is there a way to get you [Palmer and Ellis] to look at it from a different perspective other than numbers and data?”
Palmer answered that he was a “numbers guy,” but that numbers were not the only variable involved in the decision and he was “disappointed in multiple dimensions.”
