Can you be an Elite Academic Institution and be an Elite Football Program?

[InstiGATOR1]

Thanks for the close reading and the fact checking on this. I totally forgot about Rutgers being in the Big Ten. And the Big Ten, as you point out, has 14 members and not 12 with both Rutgers and Nebraska being members. I will edit my post to make those corrections.

No problem, but I must admit I did not really fact check your post. I just remembered that when UNL was kicked out/left the AAU it meant they were the only Big Ten member not in the AAU. I too could not remember Rutgers was a member and had to look up the 14 member.

 

[gatorev12]

That is a bit of an odd response to a post claiming it is much harder to rank universities than football programs. In your particular example, Michigan is to my mind a much better graduate institution than UND but some view UND as a better place to be an undergrad. This interesting site I found looking around the internet say what percent goes where when accepted by two different schools:

Compare Colleges: Side-by-side college comparisons | Parchment - College admissions predictions.

supports your contention about UND, but again that is for undergraduate programs.

BTW, that site also supports my conjecture about Wake and UNC:

Compare Colleges: Side-by-side college comparisons | Parchment - College admissions predictions.

Finally for the amusement of all here there is:

Compare Colleges: Side-by-side college comparisons | Parchment - College admissions predictions.

I'd agree that it's far tougher and more subjective to rank universities than athletic programs; and would also agree that UM has better graduate programs than ND does (mostly due to the fact UM has a med school and more grad programs than ND does). I just found it curious that you'd characterize Stanford and Michigan as being elite; and ND as not being in that category--when the rankings place them in between the two.

 

[NVGator]

I was in the middle of posting the same thing when I saw your post come in. Exactly correct.

let's look at the AP Final Football Top 20, and see how many are in the Top 20 Public or Private Academic Universities:

1. Clemson (61) - Public - Academic top 20 - No
2. Alabama - Public - Academic top 10 - No
3. Ohio State - Public - Academic top 20 - Yes (#17)
4. Oklahoma - Public - Academic top 10 - No
5. Notre Dame - Private - Academic top 20 - Yes (#18)
6. LSU- Public - Academic top 20 - No
T7. Florida - Public - Academic top 20 - Yes (#8)
T7. Georgia - Public - Academic top 20 - Yes (#13)
9. Texas - Public - Academic top 20 - Yes (#15)
10. Washington State - Public - Academic top 20 - No
11. UCF - Public - Academic top 20 - No
12. Kentucky - Public - Academic top 20 - No
13. Washington - Public - Academic top 20 - Yes (#20)
14. Michigan - Public - Academic top 20 - Yes (#4)
15. Syracuse - Private - Academic top 20 - No
16. Texas A&M - Public - Academic top 20 - No
17. Penn State - Public - Academic top 20 - Yes (#20)
18. Fresno State - Public - Academic top 20 - No
19. Army West Point - Public - Academic top 20 - No
20. West Virginia - Public - Academic top 20 - No

Stanford?

 

[InstiGATOR1]

I'd agree that it's far tougher and more subjective to rank universities than athletic programs; and would also agree that UM has better graduate programs than ND does (mostly due to the fact UM has a med school and more grad programs than ND does). I just found it curious that you'd characterize Stanford and Michigan as being elite; and ND as not being in that category--when the rankings place them in between the two.

Depends on the ranking. Stanford and Michigan are in the AAU and UND is not. Other rankings would rank the three schools differently and the AAU membership is based on criteria related to graduate programs mainly.