2021 NESCAC Season

[GoNats]

Anybody hearing anything? I've heard from a reliable source that at least one Ivy League school is cancelling all sports for 2021-22. Ugh.

[polarbear]

Bowdoin had an alumni town hall during which they said some interesting stuff:
- At least some of next year will be remote because some faculty have pre-existing conditions
- They are coordinating with other NESCAC schools
- Someone asked about athletics and they said they were important and hoped not to cancel them

[barbotus]

Bowdoin had an alumni town hall during which they said some interesting stuff:
- At least some of next year will be remote because some faculty have pre-existing conditions
- They are coordinating with other NESCAC schools
- Someone asked about athletics and they said they were important and hoped not to cancel them

School said a LOT more interesting stuff today. Wow.

[polarbear]

Yeah, not impressed with what I heard about the decision making process

[bobcatchronic]

Bowdoin had an alumni town hall during which they said some interesting stuff:
- At least some of next year will be remote because some faculty have pre-existing conditions
- They are coordinating with other NESCAC schools
- Someone asked about athletics and they said they were important and hoped not to cancel them

School said a LOT more interesting stuff today. Wow.

That’s a pretty significant step by Bowdoin. As far as I know, they’re the only ones going that far. I think Bates should be finalizing their plan soon. From what I hear, all of the coaches across the conference are doing their best to find ways to safely get their entire teams in the water this coming year, and still find a way to hopefully have a conference meet. Fingers crossed that can happen.

[WesD03]

Williams just cancelled fall sports. Guessing that may be the domino...

https://247sports.com/Article/williams- ... 148665825/

[GoNats]

I don't want to "out" anyone, but several top Williams men's swimmers have committed to taking the year off and returning to what will presumably be a full NESCAC season next year. Should make for a very interesting 2021-2022 season as many of the best swimmers over a five year period compete for conference honors.

[polarbear]

I don't want to "out" anyone, but several top Williams men's swimmers have committed to taking the year off and returning to what will presumably be a full NESCAC season next year. Should make for a very interesting 2021-2022 season as many of the best swimmers over a five year period compete for conference honors.

Interesting approach -- I guess it depends on whether or not you believe there will be a spring season. I believe Williams is back on campus, which would allow them to train with Kuster and with the relaxation of NESCAC rules they could start training even earlier. They could compete in the fall as Purple Valley Aquatics, if they want, and be ready to go for NESCACs with an extra month of training. I believ A v W is @ W this year, so they could even rest for that and make cuts if they want.

Now, if you believe there won't be a spring season its all moot, but theres at least an argument to be made that there is more opportunity this year than most.

[bobcatchronic]

I don't want to "out" anyone, but several top Williams men's swimmers have committed to taking the year off and returning to what will presumably be a full NESCAC season next year. Should make for a very interesting 2021-2022 season as many of the best swimmers over a five year period compete for conference honors.

I’m curious - what’s the benefit of this? Are these people planning on taking a full year off from school? Or just saving a year of eligibility so that they can swim in grad school? If it’s taking a full year off...I can’t say I understand delaying graduating for a year just for a chance to beat Tufts one more time.

[GoNats]

Interesting approach -- I guess it depends on whether or not you believe there will be a spring season. I believe Williams is back on campus, which would allow them to train with Kuster and with the relaxation of NESCAC rules they could start training even earlier. They could compete in the fall as Purple Valley Aquatics, if they want, and be ready to go for NESCACs with an extra month of training. I believ A v W is @ W this year, so they could even rest for that and make cuts if they want.

Now, if you believe there won't be a spring season its all moot, but theres at least an argument to be made that there is more opportunity this year than most.

If I understand correctly, it doesn't look like Williams (including student athletes) will be on campus between Thanksgiving and mid-to-late February, so that means no coaches practices for the nearly three months leading up to NESCACs. So I'm not optimistic. Also, the conference does not seem to have had much a role in coordinating the actions of individual schools, and they're all over the place. Herding them all in one direction will be hard. And I couldn't help but take note at how readily the schools shanked all spring 2020 and then fall 2020 sports. So long as the pandemic continues through November, one might fairly ask, "What makes winter sports so special?"

Fingers crossed, though. I'd love to see those returning swimmers get a shot at a 2020-21 season.

[rambo]

I don't want to "out" anyone, but several top Williams men's swimmers have committed to taking the year off and returning to what will presumably be a full NESCAC season next year. Should make for a very interesting 2021-2022 season as many of the best swimmers over a five year period compete for conference honors.

I’m curious - what’s the benefit of this? Are these people planning on taking a full year off from school? Or just saving a year of eligibility so that they can swim in grad school? If it’s taking a full year off...I can’t say I understand delaying graduating for a year just for a chance to beat Tufts one more time.

Tufts is obviously unique within the conference in the sense that if senior swimmers wanted to finish school and their eligibility is retained they have a variety of "fifth year" Master's opportunities allowing them to complete their careers with their teammates. From the Williams perspective, even if they don't use their eligibility, if they enroll at school and graduate this year they're either done with swimming or have to start with a brand new team while pursuing a graduate degree. From their perspective it's probably not specifically about beating Tufts one more time but finishing their careers the right way with their teammates by their side.

With that being said as a Jumbo guy I wouldn't mind seeing lovette, karofsky, pearcy, Craig, westphal, etc. finish their careers where they can't hurt us

[100Breast]

I think the idea is that, as it stands, the swimmers that are planning on taking a year off are doing so not solely because of swimming, but for a few reasons:

1) Of course, the guarantee of a full swim season is a big factor.

2) They have good opportunities lined up to continue throughout their semester/year off- generally continuing summer internships / other work.

3) And, most important, they want to finish out their collegiate careers in a more meaningful way than the abridged program that Williams is currently offering. You can't pretend that the reality of a COVID world doesn't mean drastic changes in the way college life will be conducted. That means socially - there's no dining in dining halls, sports will be different, Winter Study is canceled, etc..., as well as academically. I think that if I were in their shoes I'd give a real solid consideration to what this senior year would even entail, and whether the experience would even be what we currently consider to be the "college experience". A lot of the promised value of the NESCAC liberal arts education is socializing with people that are outside of your normal comfort zone, exploring courses, interacting with professor, etc... Now many of these things are no longer an option. Socializing will be kept to an absolute minimum. People will not be reaching outside of their comfort zone for fear of illness. Classes will be much more limited, and, certainly, while options to meet / interact with professors & classmates will be there, they will certainly be different. In my eyes, it's not as foolhardy as it might initially seem to take a gap year to work on passion projects or a job in this year off. In fact, it may even be the best of both worlds. You get to get real life experience, or do something that you might do in your first year out of college (shadowing medically, intern, work), but just pushed up a year. Then, you get to go back to a much more "normal" college experience than is currently being offered...

[imJumbo]

I would absolutely take a year off this year. you're paying full tuition for online classes from a top tier school? without any social interaction? no way.

stay home, workout, find some other thing to put your focus into. of course this is all dependent on different home and financial situations and will vary widely. but I just don't understand the reason to pay that much money for a year online.

nescac teams could be SO FULL of talent in 2021-2022.

also, still wish we could have seen Gu at NCAAs. Not a small chance that he'd have 2 national records, and could have seen the first sub 1:20 200 free relay in conference history. would have been cool.

[GoNats]

Agree with all of that, imJumbo. Very sad that Gu’s remarkable career was cut short.

Looks like Emory and Chicago are making it official.

https://swimswam.com/top-diii-swim-prog ... ough-2020/

“Emory University and University of Chicago have canceled all sports competitions – as well as training activities, in Emory’s case – during the upcoming fall semester, including those for winter sports, they announced Friday.”

“Kenyon, another perennial top three finisher for both genders, already announced it won’t be competing this fall, as did MIT, Williams and Pomona-Pitzer. Denison, the third team that is historically in the battle for a team title, has yet to make an announcement.“

[RetiredJet]

Nescacs has been canceled https://nescac.com/news/2020/10/8/nesca ... ports.aspx

Now ncaa still seems like it might happen so it’ll be interesting to see what happens for each team