JK37 wrote:olldflame wrote:Division 2 schools often have no greater resources than their D3 counterparts, but they have to spend a portion of what they have to fund scholarships, which would leave less for facilities.
This is it in a nutshell. I would counter that most D3’s have more money than D2’s, because average tuition is much higher at D3’s. They are also completely enrollment driven through athletics, so they have even more incentive to enhance athletic facilities.
D2 is one step above JUCO. And sometimes below it.
The average D3 school is also a private school, so that kinda makes a big difference in regards to tuition. There are a lot of state schools as there is 450+ D3 schools, but I would say a big majority are private schools.
For example, only two state D3 schools in VA (Christopher Newport, Mary Washington), but 18 private D3s. Also zero public D3s in North Carolina.
On the other hand, nearly every D3 in Wisconsin is a state school. Most of the state D3s seem to be in the Midwest and New York.
There are a lot of D3 schools that are quite wealthy. Of the 100 schools listed (15 are international or don't sponsor athletics) for biggest endowment in the world at the below link, 21* are D3s and 0* are D2s.
https://thebestschools.org/features/ric ... -research/
*Doesn't include schools that may fall under that fall under the state school systems for endowment purposes, like Texas and California, for example. Johns Hopkins is also D3 in everything but lacrosse