Wow, I've been out of pocket for a couple of weeks and come back to this thread...
As a parent of a NESCAC softball player....
1) The schools may be small but the rivalries are intense and things have gotten out of hand from time to time although I haven't seen it in softball yet. DD informs that there have been incidents in football, soccer, basketball, and lacrosse that she knows of. Usually some alcohol involved. Did "booing" need to be mentioned in the letter? Maybe not, but I don't think anyone should connect that to these schools trying to coddle anyone or turn athletics into rec league where everyone's a winner. If you haven't been to a NESCAC sporting event, at least at Williams, Amherst, or Tufts, then you have no friggin idea how badly they want to beat each other and how important it is to the players and fans. You may say who cares who wins between Amherst and Williams, and I will say who cares who wins between UCLA and Oregon. To each his own.
2) D1 vs D3 - I will say the following: if Tufts was in the Ivy League this last year they would have won it. If Tufts was in the Patriot League, they would have won that, too. And if they had gone out and played in the Mary Nutter they would have had their asses handed to them. And if they had won either the Ivy or Pat League they would have gone to the WCWS and promptly been eliminated. The Ivy, some of the Pat League, and those NESCAC schools that recruit nationally are all fighting for the same kids, especially NESCAC and Ivy and since neither offers athletic scholarships I believe the overall talent level across those conferences is pretty balanced as the admissions standards are pretty comparable. DD looked at (and was looked at by) several Ivies and vice versa for any number of players we know.
People seem to forget that D1 encompasses a huge range of schools from the big ones we all know of to much smaller schools (ever been to Sam Houston State?) that don't have big recruiting budgets. The better D3's can hold their own against some of these smaller schools. Finally, in a number of sports, the NCAA doesn't segregate schools by division, it's a free for all, and some of these smaller schools do quite well against the big boys. There are also schools who play some sports at D3 and others at higher division levels. D1 is not an automatic indicator of athletic supremacy.
3) There are a million ways to rank colleges. My kid's school was #1 in some ranking and not even in the top 25 in another one. Who cares... Go to the college that is the right fit for you and choose a degree program that you have interest in, and can lead you to where you want to go in life.
Finally, maybe Uno needs to send out a letter to the board that bans taunting, vulgarity, and booing so we can all get back to rooting for our kids and everyone else's...