Is it better to be a small fish in a big pond, or a big fish in a small pond? Most Division III women's lacrosse coaches seem to prefer the former, but they are determined to make the latter a success.

Since 1985, the Division III championship and the Division I championship, which was known as the National Collegiate Championship until last year, have been held at the same site. This season Division III will move to a separate site. The semifinals and final will be played May 18-19 at Rowan University, while the Division I semifinals and final will be May 17 and 19 at Loyola College (Maryland).

Sue Scheetz, assistant director of athletics at Pennsylvania State University and chair of the Division I Women's Lacrosse Committee, said her group favored the change after receiving numerous concerns from Division I participants regarding championship practice time, game times, hotels and banquet issues.

"While the committee was able to address some of those, we were not able to address all of them simply because of the size and the scope of the (combined) championships," Scheetz said. "Our hope is that separate sites will be able to provide the best possible experience for the participating student-athletes and coaches."

While the Division III Women's Lacrosse Committee favored maintaining the combined-site championship for Divisions I and III, Dana Harmon, associate director of athletics at Wellesley College and chair of the committee, said she looks forward to the opportunities a separate championship presents.

"This (split) had been talked about for the past few years and we understood the motivation for separating," Harmon said. "We are turning it into a positive for our sport and our campuses. Lacrosse will have multiple championships sites to spread the word of women's lacrosse rather than just one.

"This will mirror what is happening in other Division III sports and we will now be the main event."

Rowan, fresh from hosting men's soccer as a non-predetermined site in 2000, jumped at the chance to host the event. In fact, Athletics Director Joy Reighn said the school had bid for it before the change, but was not selected.

"We knew they were looking and I don't think anyone else applied (this time)," said Reighn, a former lacrosse player herself. "I talked to my coaching staff to see how they felt about it and they said 'go for it.' We were willing to be the guinea pig."

A lacrosse hotbed

Harmon said that while her committee usually would have had more time to select a championship site, it couldn't have found a better one than the Glassboro, New Jersey, school.

"We are thrilled that Rowan was able to step forward," Harmon said. "In the future we will want to get a host at least a year ahead, but we are lucky to be going to such a great place considering that the decision to split came at the last hour (at last year's Division I Women's Lacrosse Committee meeting). We are confident that they will do a great job."

Middlebury College coach Missy Foote, whose team has won two of the past three championships, said she thought Rowan was a solid choice.

"It's important to be in an area where there is a lot of high-school lacrosse nearby," Foote said. "Rowan is a good site."

Mary Marino, the coach at Rowan, said that getting the high-school players to attend is the key, pointing out that in some ways Division III may be more attractive to some of them for the same reason Rowan hosting is a good thing for her team -- it makes a sometimes lofty goal more tangible.

"I think a lot of the high-school players may be able to identify with the Division III style of play better than with that of Division I, so that may help us," she said.

Marino added that sometimes in Division I, it can be such a different game that high-school players think college play is an unrealistic goal for them.

Foote said the experience of being on the same stage with the Division I teams was "incredible" but that a separate championship can be, too, in its own way. She said Middlebury would like to have hosted but its graduation events conflicted with the dates, something Reighn said could have happened with Rowan had the school not changed from its traditional graduation date before the subject of hosting came up.

"We will make this work. It will be a great tournament," Foote said. "It won't be the same as before, but in four years, no one will know the difference."

Surface change

A sidelight of the change this year is that the Division III games will be played on grass rather than artificial turf, which hasn't happened since 1994. Most coaches said that change wouldn't be a factor since most Division III teams play their regular season on grass.

"It won't hurt the turf teams going to grass because they will be going to a slower game and will be able to adjust, and it won't hurt the grass teams because they are used to it," Marino said. "It's harder for a grass team to adjust to turf than it is for a turf team to adjust to grass."

Marino coached the Rowan field hockey team to that sport's 2000 semifinals, which were played on campus at Salisbury University, a non-predetermined site. She supported the Division III-only concept in and of itself, given her field hockey experience.

"We realized how this puts the focus on just the four Division III teams and makes those teams feel special," Marino said. "The players realized that there are a hundred other schools that were not there. The spectators are more focused (on Division III) because they don't have to share the limelight with Division I."

Although Rowan didn't officially find out it was hosting lacrosse until November, Reighn said there's plenty of time to do things properly, obviously much more than if an on-campus host were selected after the last four teams in the tournament are determined.

"With a predetermined site, you have time to do the same things you have to do in two or three days with a non-predetermined site, so you can do them better," Reighn said. "You can get more publicity this way, and I think the key to succeeding is being able to sell the championship."

Of course, an on-campus tournament-participant host generally can count on the home crowd coming without having to do much selling, but such a luxury does not exist for the predetermined site, unless, of course, the host advances that far.

Rowan last made the championship tournament in 1999, so Reighn knows that having the home-team luxury isn't something she can count on. Marino knows that, too, but the chance to host does give her team an advantage that no other team has.

"I discussed the possibility of hosting with the team and that we can't count on being there and they are very supportive of hosting it," Marino said. "I've shown the team where the games will be played and where the practices and the banquet will be held, and told them that they are the only team in the country that knows that right now. They realize this is a pretty special opportunity and they are psyched about it."

Exploring a date separation

Once the season ends, Division III will be looking for future sites. The College of New Jersey hosted the combined championship three times and also hosted the inaugural National Collegiate Championship in 1982, so it's a viable candidate. Since it hosted field hockey, Salisbury might be a candidate. Obviously, most Division III schools do not have the facilities to host the combined championship, so more Division III schools should be in a position to host now that the championship is on its own.

Amherst College coach Chris Paradis, whose team played in the title game last year, said her school was interested in hosting this year but couldn't because of facilities.

"We talked about doing it in our football stadium but the field is too narrow," she said. "Our regular field does not have a stadium, it's just a field, so we couldn't do it there."

Paradis allowed that Amherst might look into hosting at an off-campus site.

Wellesley also is a potential candidate, according to Harmon.

"Before this year the logistics of hosting so many teams in a combined championship and the facility and staff limitations would have prevented us from hosting," she said. "This change makes it much more manageable (for all potential hosts)."

With only Division III in the picture, managing the event is easier from many perspectives. Harmon pointed out that Division III previously was tied to the Division I schedule. This change frees the committee to explore playing on a different weekend from Division I, which would avoid splitting what may be a limited pool of spectators. Paradis said that would be good.

"I think there's a definite fan base for lacrosse and my sense is that (with the combined event) we benefited from the fan base for Division I lacrosse and that they benefited from us," she said. "This will split that fan base and Division I won't have as much of a problem with that. We can have a great (Division III) championship, but it will be challenging."

Another factor that may play a part in a future date change is that the bracket was expanded to 18 teams from 16 for this season. The year before, the committee had moved to regional sites for the first- and second-round games to eliminate midweek games. Now, with 18 teams, midweek games are back. Harmon said that these midweek games are a concern for many schools and that the committee will seek input from coaches to help resolve that issue.

"With a separate championship, we now have the opportunity to explore other dates and to develop the championship to better serve our student-athletes," she said.