For the first time, SUNY-ESF has joined an athletic conference, joining the Hudson Valley Intercollegiate Athletic Conference.

The State University of New York College of Environmental Science and Forestry, along with Davis College, has joined the HVIAC, giving the school its first opportunity to compete in conference play and national tournaments and develop rivalries.

SUNY-ESF is still fairly new to college athletics as a whole and right now the NCAA is not taking any new Division III schools, which is also very expensive, but this league allows teams the chance to compete in newer events, said John View, the head cross country and track and field coach at the school.

“The opportunity for our athletes to compete in a conference championship event is a goal that they can shoot for,” he said.

SUNY-​ESF originally attempted to join the conference three years ago but membership was declined due to logistic concerns and the fact that SUNY-ESF Varsity Athletics was a relatively new program at the institution.

Historically, the HVIAC was two different conferences, a men’s and a women’s conference. It started off as a women’s conference for non-NCAA schools to give women at those schools the same opportunities that were afforded to the men. It gradually expanded to a men’s conference and then was recently combined into a single conference.

Daniel Ramin, the head soccer coach and the coordinator of college athletics at SUNY-ESF, said in an email that in recent years, athletics at SUNY-ESF has made great steps forward, receiving national recognition with its cross country and soccer programs, and even currently holding first place in the United States Collegiate Athletic Association Director’s Cup. SUNY-ESF currently leads the competition with 385.5 points, which are awarded for number of sport offerings and are also based on results from USCAA national championship events.

“The most important aspect of joining this conference is our student athletes will immediately be able to compete for team and individual conference accolades,” Ramin said. “Within this conference I am sure great rivalries will develop and the experience of being an ESF student athlete will benefit.”

The next challenge within the conference is to have it become a USCAA recognized conference, which would enable conference champions to receive an automatic bid in USCAA national tournament for participating sports. The USCAA met with the conference this month, and the process for that to happen has begun, Ramin added.

Joe Bednarsh, president of the HVIAC, added that the conference has been a great stepping-stone for non-NCAA teams to bring its programs up to speed and become NCAA members. Some of the schools in the conference, such as the Culinary Institute, have classes that run until 9 p.m., which would not be able to participate in the NCAA.

“Hudson Valley is really a conference that believes in making accommodations for these kinds of unique schools and being there so that those students have the opportunity to participate in intercollegiate athletics, which is an integral part of college education,” Bednarsh said. “Take a school like ESF, for example, which is just so unique and so incredible in its mission, and that adds gravitas to the conference itself.”

What makes the HVIAC different is that it’s not a cutthroat organization, Bednarsh said, but that it focuses on increasing the diversity in the program by including unique institutions and helping those schools grow.

“I think it’s important to highlight the uniqueness of each of these institutions,” Bednarsh said. “Each institution comes with its own unique set of issues, but the great thing about the Hudson Valley is that we’re here almost to service those particular types of institutions because it makes us more interesting, it makes us a better educational experience for the athletes.”

Published on February 1, 2015 at 11:01 pm

Contact Anjali: acalwis@syr.edu