[eDebate] The collapse of the NDT and stuff

[Terrance Shuman]

De-cloaking again, briefly...

This is the kind of thing I do when insomnia strikes...   ;-)

At 11:27 AM 3/4/2004, Duane Hyland wrote:

>I would predict, that if we did a study, that we would find that all 
>schools who have won the NDT in the last twenty years, we would find that 
>they all have more in common than not.

Let me get you started, Duane.  NDT finalists (I decided to include the 
runners-up to see if it altered the essential composition of the list) from 
1984-2003 are:

Baylor (3 appearances, 2 titles)
Dartmouth (5 appearances, 3 titles)
Emory (5 appearances, 2 titles)
Georgetown (3 appearances, 1 title)
Georgia (1 appearance)
Harvard (5 appearances, 2 titles)
Iowa (3 appearances, 1 title)
Kentucky (2 appearances, 1 title)
Louisville (1 appearance)
Northwestern (6 appearances, 6 titles)
Michigan (2 appearances)
Michigan State (1 appearance)
Redlands (2 appearances, 1 title)
Wake Forest (1 appearance, 1 title)

You can have your own fun assessing the implications of this list, of 
course, but the things which jump out at me immediately are:  1) 14 schools 
account for 40 final round slots; 2) 10 schools account for 90 percent of 
the available slots (36 of 40) and 95 percent of the championships (19 of 
20); 3) private institutions account for 75 percent of the slots (30 of 40) 
and 90 percent of the titles (18 of 20).

If you want a real eye-opener, though, just look at how the nature of the 
institutions that show up in semis/finals has changed over time.  Whitman's 
semis appearance was the first time a small, high-caliber academic 
institution got so close to a title in a decade (since Wayne State's semis 
appearance in 1993).  Compare that to, say, the 1950s, when you had 
Augustana (multiple appearances), College of the Holy Cross, DePauw, Wilkes 
College, St. Joseph's, Greenville College, Fordham, Kansas State Teachers 
College (not sure whether this was KSTC-Pittsburg or KSTC-Emporia) and 
Wisconsin-Eau Claire reaching at least the semis.  That decade also saw 
USMA make several appearances among the elite Final Four (one title, one 
runner-up, two semis teams).  In the 1960s you had College of the Holy 
Cross, Pacific, King's College, Carson-Newman, Wayne State (multiple 
appearances), Butler, Loyola-Los Angeles, Canisius, and Navy making the 
Final Four.  In the 1970s you had Oberlin, Brown, Augustana (multiple 
appearances), and Samford.  But in the 1980s The List had taken over, with 
only a single semis appearance by Samford and a couple by Loyola-Marymount 
disturbing the hegemony of the Usual Suspects.  It was much the same in the 
1990s, with only Wayne State's aforementioned 3rd place finish in '93 
marring an absolute domination by an elite handful of schools.  Again, you 
may draw whatever conclusions you care to about this sea-change in the 
activity...

Enjoy yourself!   ;-)

Solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and...well, not so tall as I used to be,

Terrance Shuman
Bishop LeBlond Memorial High School
St. Joseph, Missouri