Sports | Sports Feature
‘Good basketball is good basketball’: Inside the online community of D-III basketball superfans

WashU head coach Pat Juckem said that Division III basketball represents the “purity” in college athletics. (Elle Su | Student Life)
When lifelong sports fan Jason Marquart began working in WashU’s Office for International Students and Scholars in 2005, he thought the on-campus basketball scene would not be worth watching.
But after a conversation with John Schael, WashU’s Athletic Director at the time, Marquart checked out a game during the 2005-06 season, when WashU’s men’s team went on to win the Division III national championship. Marquart quickly began following the Bears’ teams, and eventually began to live-tweet their games, creating a basketball-focused X account under the nickname “Hilltopper” in August 2020.
“I just started tweeting a lot of basketball stuff, and suddenly parents were following me, players were following me,” Marquart said. “You know, there’s people in the D-III community who do the same thing. And I just kind of got caught up in it and haven’t stopped.”
In the world of college basketball, Division III programs are often overlooked. Most D-III athletes don’t play for national glory, future NBA careers, or to profit off of their name, image, and likeness. Yet to all those who have found a special community around Division III athletics, the D-III tier — where student-athletes are able to pursue a more well-rounded college experience than Division I athletes — stands out.
“It just draws a stark contrast today between, you know, there’s some unhealthy things in big-time athletics, the purity is this level,” Pat Juckem, head coach of WashU men’s basketball, said. “These are your classmates — these guys are grinding for finals, just like you guys are. But they also are putting in three-plus hours a day year-round to do what they love.”
Juckem’s sentiment was echoed by Riley Zayas, a 20-year-old college student who runs “The scoop on D3 women’s hoops” and “True to the Cru.” Zayas first started covering sports at age 13 as a member of Sports Illustrated’s kid reporter program, but eventually transitioned into covering the University of Mary Hardin-Baylor and the D-III level.
“This is a really special division of college athletics,” Zayas said. “No one’s on athletic scholarships — they’re there for the passion of the game.”
Ever since the NCAA created the Division III level in 1973, the landscape surrounding D-III basketball has changed tremendously. In 1994, the creation of the d3hoops.com website provided an early stage for D-III basketball on the internet. Under the stewardship of Patrick Coleman, Gordon Mann, Dave McHugh, and Ryan Scott, the website’s message boards served as a breeding ground for discussion, debate, and community-building among D-III fans.
Over the last decade, however, X and other social media sites have become the hub of the D-III community. Coleman’s d3hoops account has amassed nearly 50,000 followers on X, while McHugh, the host of D-III hoops talk show Hoopsville, and Bob Quillman, the host of the Q-Cast podcast, have both accrued over 10,000 followers.
Ever since Quillman started covering D-III basketball in the early ‘90s as the student-manager of Illinois Wesleyan University’s campus radio station, technological advancements — including social media and live-streaming — have transformed the sport.
“It’s changed everything. Back 30 years ago when I was in school, you didn’t know anything about any other part of the country,” Quillman said. “… It’s made Division III basketball available to anyone that cares, and it’s just created a deeper understanding of the whole division.”
In that time, Quillman has found a tight-knit community. He interacts with D-III fans, players, and coaches online daily and has built what he describes as “real relationships” through meeting many of these people in person.
“It’s a smaller community than Division I basketball, but I’d argue that the community is every bit as passionate, if not a little more so, because everyone’s a little more closely connected to their team,” Quillman said.

Matt Snyder, Zac Snyder, Ryan Whitnable, Bob Quillman, and Riley Zayas (from right to left) watch the Great Lakes Invitational, an annual in-season tournament featuring some of Division III’s premier teams, in Grand Rapids, Michigan. (Courtesy of Riley Zayas)
Quillman travels regularly to watch his alma mater Illinois Wesleyan, and he attends the D-III Final Four and in-season tournaments like the Great Lakes Invitational almost every year. And Quillman balances the hours spent traveling, watching games, tweeting, and recording podcasts with his full-time job at an insurance company in Texas.
“It gets a little busy. I have a great job, I love it,” he said. “… It’s like anything else: You learn to prioritize what you need to prioritize in life and then what’s left over for things like this little hobby of mine, which is the D-III stuff that comes with any remaining time that’s left over.”
For the players and coaches competing for championships at the Division III level, the community provides much-appreciated greater visibility for their sports.
“I think what’s cool about those guys is just their genuine passion and interest for Division III hoops. They have full families and lives, and instead of watching Division I or NBA, these guys are devoting a significant amount of time to making sure we get our little bit of publicity, which is pretty cool,” WashU senior guard Hayden Doyle, who was a guest on Quillman’s Q-Cast in January 2024, said. “It’s pretty cool for us when we see people interested in our games, talking about our conference and our team.”
For Zayas, one of the biggest drivers of this community is that almost no one is receiving a paycheck for their coverage of D-III basketball — most are doing it purely for their love of the game.
“I know there’s several people who have a job [covering sports], and they enjoy it, but they’re always looking to move up rank. It’s a career for them,” Zayas said. “For those of us who are covering Division III, it’s more of ‘We have a passion for this,’ and that’s not going to change.”
Coverage of Division III basketball is constantly evolving. For example, Zayas identified that there was a lot of attention being shown to the men’s programs, but not enough being given to the women’s teams. As a result, Zayas started a Substack dedicated to D-III women’s basketball. He is also in the process of writing a book, hoping to continue documenting the stories behind D-III basketball and bringing it to new audiences.
“I didn’t know what made [D-III] special. I didn’t know that it was as high a level of athletics as it really is,” Zayas said. “And once I saw that, I thought [that] this would be a great way and a great book opportunity to bring some attention to [it].”
Those with a passion for D-III hoops appreciate what makes it special, and want to share it with the world. Doyle recalls having a few family friends come to a game and say that they preferred the D-III game over D-I or the NBA because D-III emphasizes skill in addition to athleticism.
“Everybody can shoot, everyone’s skilled, and everyone plays hard, which I think is unique in basketball today,” Doyle said. “At the Division III level, it’s the purest form.”
Although Marquart now works in the Office of International Services at Division I Saint Louis University (SLU), he still prefers the WashU games.
“I’ll probably go to a couple of [SLU] games, but there’s just something about pulling up five minutes before the game starts, [being] closer to the gym floor than I would be at SLU. And there’s a group of regulars that I talk to when I’m [at WashU],” Marquart said. “I’m pretty much hooked on WashU basketball.”
For those who are skeptical of the Division III level, Quillman has a simple answer, referencing a line from Emory University head coach Jason Zimmerman: “Good basketball is good basketball.”
“Come to a game. Come watch Illinois Wesleyan play WashU. And I would argue that it’s as good or better basketball than you will get on any TV channel of any D-I game during the season,” Quillman said. “If you like basketball … it’s as good as it gets.”