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Warhawks set to return strong

As far as the UW-Whitewater football team is concerned, Mount Union is an honorary member of the Wisconsin Intercollegiate Athletic Conference.

For the past four Division III football seasons, the Warhawks have played Mount Union (Ohio) just as many times as it has played UW-Stout, UW-Oshkosh, UW-Platteville, UW-Stevens Point and UW-River Falls.

The Warhawks could not overcome Mount Union’s three-touchdown first quarter Saturday and lost the national championship game, 31-26. It was the third time in four years that the Purple Raiders beat Whitewater in the title game.

For fans whose only exposure to Division III football is the national title game on an ESPN station might be sick of watching these two purple-clad teams playing every year in the final game.

They better get used to it.

From the looks of things, Mount Union and Whitewater appear set to rule that division for seasons to come.

It’s easy to forecast Mount Union’s appearance in the Amos Alonzo Stagg Bowl. The Purple Raiders have won 10 NCAA Division III football titles in the past 16 seasons and are a mind-boggling 275-21-3 under coach Larry Kehres.

Mount Union has a “football factory”-type of program, with an 84-man freshman team and a 74-man varsity roster this season.

The Purple Raiders play in the Ohio Athletic Conference, a league that is a few notches below the depth and quality of the WIAC. Mount Union has no trouble winning the league title—the Purple Knights have won the championship 17 straight years—and rarely have to go on the road for a playoff game.

Even with the loss of quarterback Greg Micheli and running back Nate Kmic, the abundance of quality players on the roster makes the Purple Raiders a solid pick for next year’s Stagg Bowl.

Meanwhile, the Warhawk football program has never been better. Whitewater is 55-5 over the past four seasons, with three of those losses to Mount Union, one to NCAA Division II St. Cloud State University and one to UW-Stevens Point by one point this year.

This was the season for the WIAC to bite the Warhawks. There were only four senior starters after the team lost 23 seniors off of the 2007 national championship team. But the Warhawks survived several tough conference games and rolled into the national title game.

Coach Lance Leipold and his quality staff will have to replace starting offensive tackles Mike Sherman and Rob Gilbreath, tight end Nick Slupski and All-America linebacker Jace Rindahl next season.

But the Warhawks have an abundance of talented players coming back.

Eleven juniors, five sophomores and two freshmen started in Saturday’s game. Five juniors, 10 sophomores and five freshmen were listed as the second-stringers.

And by getting to the national title game each of the past four seasons, the seniors have played 20 more games and have had 20 more weeks of practice than players at other WIAC schools.

Rindahl played in 60 games at Whitewater, which equates to two more regular seasons than players at Oshkosh, Platteville and most of the other WIAC rivals play.

“That’s why we run sprints, lift weights and do all the other sacrifices the athletes make,” Leipold said. “It’s to play on Saturdays. And to get 60 of them is huge.”

You heard the saying, “The rich get richer.” Whitewater is the Bill Gates of the WIAC.

Going to the national championship game four straight years—and being on an ESPN channel—gives the Warhawks a huge recruiting advantage the other WIAC programs can only dream about.

That overcomes the disadvantage of having to continue weekly coaching duties while other WIAC programs are putting their entire effort into recruiting.

“To get on TV again really helps,” Leipold said last week. “It promotes the program and helps get people excited about being part of Warhawk football. I think the four years in a row shows the stability and tradition of we have here.”

All the new buildings and facilities that have been constructed in the last five years have made UW-Whitewater the leader in that category in the WIAC. Several league coaches remarked about that during the conference media day in August.

If the Warhawks’ record doesn’t open the eyes of prospective players, the facilities usually do. Even the St. Louis Rams were impressed with offerings when they were shopping for a summer training camp site.

So the Warhawks have the results, the facilities and a solid academic offering to sway talented high school seniors. In addition, Whitewater is the closest state school to Chicago and its multitude of athletes.

All of that gives Leipold and his staff an in-road to players other state schools probably can’t hope to get.

“Obviously there are a lot of athletes that we want that are being looked at by scholarship schools,” Leipold said of next year’s recruiting class. “They have to weigh those opportunities. But once the dust settles, we hope they at least give us the opportunity in January to come over and take a look at us.”

Several of them likely will. And that will help keep the Warhawks being a player in the national title scene for seasons to come.