The Lion King
Junior
Posts: 257
Reg: 11-10-06
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04-10-09 05:12 PM - Post#62492
Well, the boys on the Penn board were all upset because their Quakers couldn’t achieve a winning record in the Ivy League. They decided that the best solution would be to join the ACC. Everyone was eagerly making Final Four plans, and then someone pointed out that the ACC is Not Exactly Our Set, Dear -- even with all those scholarships, which only improve academic performance.
So then they decided to start up a new league with big-time schools like Duke and Stanford and . . . um, did I say Duke? Oh, and Vanderbilt and Northwestern too. You know, big-time basketball schools like that. Also Rice. And Duke -- did I mention Duke? All these places have such sterling academic credentials that within a few years you’d see Cambridge and Oxford joining, and then Yale and Harvard could go get bent for all Penn would care.
This idea sounded promising, but the travel requirement might have been too great, and then someone pointed out that it’s unclear whether Duke would be interested in leaving the ACC. That pretty much ended the discussion. After all, you have to be realistic about these things.
So now they’ve pinned their hopes on scholarships and a post-season tournament, and you really should check it out, because I don’t recall any previous discussion of these topics on any of our boards. A tournament, it is predicted, would get the Ivy League a Thursday-night game in early March on one of ESPN’s fifteen channels, and this would be an enormous boost to the league’s prestige. As for scholarships, with them in place, the Ivy champion would be powerful enough to sometimes lose in the second round of the NCAA tournament instead of the first. If only the league presidents realized how greatly this would advance their academic mission, they would institute scholarships tomorrow.
Besides, we already have scholarships, because the rich schools are waiving tuition for all students with family income below a certain amount. To level the playing field, every school must be allowed to grant athletic scholarships, so that Penn can continue to attract top talent with the Palestra, the Big Five, Wharton, and its fervent corps of supporters. Otherwise some schools would have an advantage, and it wouldn’t be fair. But none of this matters, because Penn can just go ahead and unilaterally decide to give special grants to talented students, including athletes, and if the rest of the league complains, Penn will tell them to take a hike. It’s surprising that no one has thought of this before.
P.S. Phila Textile is now the U. of Philadelphia but I still call it Phila Textile
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s.martin up
Sophomore
Posts: 144
Loc: NY
Reg: 07-30-06
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04-10-09 07:06 PM - Post#62493
In response to The Lion King
Brilliant!!! Rolling Over lol.
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Howard Gensler
Postdoc
Posts: 4141
Reg: 11-21-04
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04-15-09 06:55 PM - Post#62616
In response to s.martin up
1968.
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palestra38
Professor
Posts: 32840
Reg: 11-21-04
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04-17-09 10:52 AM - Post#62666
In response to Howard Gensler
Great synopsis, LK, but it just goes to show you that losing at Penn creates angst. When you support the school that defines losing, it's easy to laugh at the guys like us that hate to lose.
That being said, 99 94/100 of what was said on that thread was utterly insane.
RIP to Marilyn Chambers, given the reference to 99 94/100.
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