Ricky Nelson posted last week on what he called 2019 Minutia, but it’s anything but that and I recommend you read it at your earliest convenience. One of the items he mentions is that there were two NCAA Tournament teams that violated the “rule of 22 dates”. I heard about this during the season but didn’t write anything about it because the teams still had a chance to correct their mistake. With the season over, let’s dive into this a bit more.
First off, if you want to see the 2019-2020 NCAA Division III Manual, click here. You’ll want to look at 17.25.5 “Number of Dates of Competition”. You’ll notice that there are not many rules the coaches have to follow here but one of them is, “A member institution shall limit its total playing schedule against outside competition during the institution’s volleyball playing season to a maximum of 22 dates of competition during the traditional segment and one during the nontraditional segment…” There are exemptions allowed to this as defined by Bylaw 17.25.5.3 but when you dive into this you find that no exemptions are actually listed. There is another rule that is written the same way but it pertains to the student-athletes. So, in other words, neither the athletes nor the team is allowed to play matches once they exceed 22 dates during the regular season (matches played in conference tournaments and the NCAA Tournament are not counted towards the 22 dates).
Alright, so there is a rule about the number of dates a D3 volleyball team can play, but how important is the rule and is it followed? During the season I reached out to a coach and asked about this rule while saying that two teams could potentially violate this rule. Their response, “That’s a big no no. I triple check every year. I even have [another] coach check mine for me.” I got the same type of responses from other coaches, as well. I admit at the time I had vaguely heard of the rule but had no clue on the exact number or whether it was strictly followed. After talking to a number of coaches, I realized this was a big deal. I made the decision to sit on this news because as I mentioned there were still dates to be played and opportunities to correct the mistake. I also wanted to give the NCAA the opportunity to step in and fix the issue. Well, the season is over so no reason to keep sitting.
The two teams that I know violated the “rule of 22 dates” were Manhattanville and St. Olaf. Both teams ended up played 23 dates but it’s interesting to know that both had actually scheduled more than that prior to the season but ended up cancelling a couple of dates during the season. St. Olaf had 7 players that played in all of their matches so they are also in violation of the bylaws. Manhattanville had 5 players that played in all of their matches. Note, it’s possible that more players violated this rule but I didn’t bother to step through all of the dates and compare them against when they played.
Past history shows us that this rule will get broken from time-to-time and I guess with the extra weekend this past season that we really shouldn’t be surprised this happened. History also tells us that the penalty will be a loss of 2 dates for every date over the 22 allowed. So, both Manhattanville and St. Olaf can expect to only have 20 playing dates in 2020. With the shorter schedule next year, it was a good time to break the rule, I guess. I don’t believe any penalties have ever been levied against the student-athletes.
It’s interesting that this is the penalty because in talking with coaches not affiliated with either school, the perception was that the penalties should be more severe. One coach told me, “They should not have been allowed to compete [in] the NCAA tournament – I say that first and foremost! This is an advantage to play extra dates and be able to spread out the matches over more days.” I will say that reaction wasn’t unique to this coach and you have to wonder if this penalty will be reevaluated in the future and made more severe.
I did reach out to the Athletic Directors and coaches from both schools as well as Jan Gentry (NCAA’s Associate Director of NCAA Championships and Alliances and the DIII Volleyball Liaison) for comments. I was interested in the penalties imposed, why this occurred and when did the schools realize their mistake. I did hear back from Emily Foster (St. Olaf’s Head Coach) on behalf of their school. Coach Foster said, “I take complete ownership for the error. I made a negligent error as I compiled our schedule and scheduled 3 dates over the limit of 22 dates, scheduling 25 total. The error was brought to our attention via our conference office. Once we gained knowledge of the error we cancelled our two remaining non-conference matches immediately. By completing our remaining conference schedule this still put us over the NCAA limit by one date. We have self reported this violation to the NCAA and have self imposed a reduction of two playing dates next year, which they have accepted. As a result we will be playing 20 dates during the 2020 season. Additionally, the entire athletic department underwent a rules education session at a recent staff meeting in order to ensure that we do not make a similar error in the future.”
I can confirm through a source at the AVCA Convention that the Rules Committee did impose the “2 for 1 rule” against two schools for exceeding the 22 playing dates. This, of course, would appear to be both St. Olaf (now confirmed) and Manhattanville. It’s interesting that I really couldn’t find anywhere in the rules that stated anything about this penalty although it seems to be the normal punishment.
As a side note, as a former software engineer, I’m curious if the NCAA has ever thought of adding a check for this in their software. Every team’s schedule with dates is loaded into their database and it wouldn’t be hard to add a sanity check that looks for this violation. It’s always better to be proactive than reactive and this is something the NCAA could do to benefit its membership. In the end, the head coach is responsible for the schedule and ensuring compliance in this matter so you have to respect Coach Foster for stepping up and taking ownership of their scheduling mistake.
If I hear back from Manhattanville or Jan Gentry then I’ll make sure to update this post.
Women's Division III Volleyball 