NAIA

ESPN3 to Provide Live Stream of Morningside/Wisconsin-Whitewater Game

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Morningside_IASioux City, Iowa – Morningside College’s (Iowa) football game against the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater on Thursday, Sept. 24 at Elwood Olsen Stadium will be streamed live on ESPN3.

The contest, slated for a 6 p.m. kickoff, will pit two of the nation’s most prominent football programs in the NAIA and NCAA Division III ranks.

Morningside played in the 2012 Russell Athletic-NAIA Football National Championship Game and has made 11 consecutive post-season appearances in the NAIA Championship Series for the longest active streak in the nation. Morningside, coming off an 11-2 finish in 2014, has won four consecutive Great Plains Athletic Conference (GPAC) championships and has a 112-23 record for a .830 winning percentage since the start of the 2004 season. The Mustangs have advanced to at least the semifinals of the NAIA Championship Series each of the last three years. Continue reading →

Ramblings of Jason Dannelly: Nebraska Wesleyan leaving the GPAC

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If you follow small college athletics you have no doubt already heard the news that Nebraska Wesleyan is leaving the Great Plains athletic conference and going full-fledged into NCAA Division III.
To be honest I wasn’t sure how much I really wanted to write about this subject. It doesn’t particularly pertaining to NAIA football and it’s really more of a membership issue of the NAIA. But given the fact that the NAIA will be losing a football member I thought I should weigh in briefly on the subject.

My biggest issue with the entire situation is how things played out for the remaining members of the Great Plains Athletic Conference. There is no doubt that Nebraska Wesleyan was always a little bit different animal with their dual affiliation in the NAIA and NCAA. In fact for the last 15 years of the Great Plains athletic members in the conference have wondered what Nebraska Wesleyan’s intention would be if they kept their dual affiliation. Continue reading →

Dale Carlson to Take Over the Lindenwood-Belleville Football Program

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Dale_Carlson

Dale Carlson – Lindenwood Belleville

Belleville, Ill. — Lindenwood University – Belleville and Director of Athletics Scott Spinner have announced the hiring of Dale Carlson as head football coach. Carlson is the second head coach for the Lynx since the inception of the program in 2012 and will take over as Lindenwood-Belleville prepares for its first season in the Mid-States Football Association (MSFA).

Carlson comes to Lindenwood-Belleville after spending last season as the assistant head coach at North Park University. Prior to that, Carlson spent four years (2010-2013) at the helm of Valparaiso University.
As the Lynx continue to build on a young program, they bring in Carlson, who has started programs at both Trine University and Ohio Dominican.

From 1994-2003, Carlson was the first head coach at Trine and held a record of 47-35 before turning his focus to Ohio Dominican, starting that program and staying there until 2010. While at Ohio Dominican, Carlson amassed a record of 36-27. Continue reading →

The Smartest Teams in NAIA Football.

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NAIA_logo_Revised

Scholar Football Teams Announced.

There is no doubt there is some correlation between having a great football team and a smart football team. Today, the NAIA announced it’s annual “Scholar Teams” list.

In order to make the list the cumulative GPA of a given team must be above a 3.0. Considering most rosters in the NAIA typically have somewhere between 80-100 players, it’s quite a feat when a football team makes the list.

This year SEVEN NAIA football teams garnered the academic award:

St. Ambrose (Iowa) – 3.27

Dakota Wesleyan (S.D.) – 3.23

Carroll (Mont.) – 3.22

Taylor (Ind.) – 3.15

Northwestern (Iowa) – 3.10

St. Francis (Ill.) – 3.03

Hastings (Neb.) – 3.00

It should be noted that the MIssouri Baptist women’s tennis team held the highest GPA of all teams participating in NAIA athletics with a 3.94 GPA.

Welcome to Road to the Chipper! The Authority on NAIA Football.

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The Tom Osborne Trophy

The Tom Osborne Trophy

Here it is, THE ROAD TO THE CHIPPER!

First things first, thanks for checking out the web site. You are here because in some way you really enjoy NAIA football. It is still a work in progress but by the time the NAIA football season rolls around I hope to have all of the bells and whistles to this site up and going.

Backing up a little bit, I’m Jason Dannelly. For lack of a better way of putting it I’ve been a guru of sorts for NAIA football since 2002. That’s when I started what was then known as NAIAFOOTBALL.NET which eventually became the Victory Sports Network then the College Fanz Sports Network then BACK to the Victory Sports Network. (Did you catch all that?) Continue reading →

Jason Dannelly Previews the NAIA Football Championship Series Semifinals

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Depending on what side of the fence you are looking, you’re either really excited or really disappointed in the NAIA Championship Series semifinal round. There aren’t many that would have predicted two weeks ago that we would be looking at SOU traveling to Saint Xavier and Marian traveling to Morningside to determine who would head to the national championship.

If you aren’t excited for the match ups then you obviously weren’t paying much attention from 2002 until about 2010. Every year the season would start and you could predict the top four teams in the NAIA and have a 50/50 shot at getting the national championship team correct. Continue reading →

JD Show Podcast: Does the current NAIA FB Championship Series need to change?

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Is the current NAIA Championship Series setup for football out of date? This week I discuss that and offers an alternative plan for the NAIA football postseason in this week’s podcast. Click below to listen.
http://victorysports.podbean.com/e/jd-show-podcast-jason-da…

Jason Dannelly Previews the NAIA Football Quarterfinals

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560204_10152799750429477_7500933386025271825_nI’m going to be completely honest. I hate round two of the NAIA Championship Series. I hate the way it’s put together, I hate when it’s played and I hate that after umpteen years no one has done anything to change it.

Some of my argument for change goes back to what I touched on last week via twitter and the need for the NAIA and its football coaches to consider a major rewrite of the NAIA Championship Series. Just like every other division of college football, things have changed. But the NAIA is the only organization that has not made a major change to its postseason qualification since it adopted its current form in 1997.

And there isn’t a person in the world that can convince me the state of NAIA football is the same now as it was in 1997. Continue reading →

Jason Dannelly Selects Winners of the First Round of the NAIA Football Championship Series

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10339739_1703721843187182_1827114446610379474_nWe’ve been on the “road” for so many years that its odd for me to envision a “race” to the NAIA National Championship. Especially given the driving conditions I had cross country the last few years getting to Rome. Although two buses stranded on I-75 in Georgia and the stories from all those involved is still one of my favorite memories from 2010.

But this year the NAIA will embark on the first of three title games in Daytona Beach aptly title the “Race to Daytona.” Previous incarnations of the game saw us on the “Road to Savannah” and the “Road to Rome.” The racing moniker fits the host and also the attitude of several of the NAIA’s best who are definitely in the fast lane towards the NAIA title game. (See what I did there?)

It’s so tough for me to pick any major upsets in the first round of the NAIA Football Championship Series in any given year. Typically if you select the chalk, you are bound to get five or six of the eight games correct. Last year the only upset was Tabor defeating Benedictine in the first round (11 over an 8). In 2012 there were two upsets, same with 2011.

But that’s not to say the NAIA postseason doesn’t go without it’s occasional craziness. In 1998, five underdogs garnered victories in the NAIA’s opening round of the championship series seeing the No. 1, No. 2, No. 5, No. 6 and No. 7 teams in the county knocked off in game one of the postseason. This led to a national championship game where the No. 8 Azusa Pacific Cougars won their first national championship game over the No. 11 Olivet Nazarene Tigers. Continue reading →

Jason Dannelly Predicts the 2014 NAIA Football Championship Series Qualifiers

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Dustin Rinker

Carroll College RB Dustin Rinker. (Helena IR Photo)

Every year this moment in the season comes and every year it’s like my version of X-Mas. There’s nothing better in my world than seeing 16 NAIA football teams advance to the postseason and letting the craziness begin.

This year, the craziness might have started a week earlier than usual. Morningside, Southern Oregon and Georgetown College both all on the final day of the NAIA football regular season changing the perspective of the NAIA postseason immensely. That’s three of the NAIA’s top five teams falling, making the new No. 1 team in the NAIA Carroll College

Being rated in the Top 2 and Top 4 are probably the two biggest factors in making the NAIA Championship Game. Top 2 (as long as you put in the bids) guarantees you home field advantage through the semis. Top 4 obviously gives you the same advantage until the semifinals which many will argue is the most important. Given the Thanksgiving holiday, no one wants to be on the road that weekend and traditionally the home teams have had a much higher rate of success than the road teams during the Turkey Day weekend.

Before predicting anything we have to know the facts. Who won, who lost and who is a conference champion. Remember, all conference champions rated No. 20 or higher earn an automatic berth. Continue reading →