Welcome to the Centennial Conference: 11 small, private liberal-arts colleges in the mid-Atlantic region that belong to the National Collegiate Athletic Association's Division III, where there are no sports scholarships to lure top-notch players. Instead, the contest to recruit the best athletes--a high-stakes game that has long defined only the marquee Division I programs--has fueled a building boom even in this academic-focused league. The competition is putting the heat on college leaders to justify the money, and often millions of dollars of debt, that institutions are shelling out for sports. The costs are straining alumni and students who must make up the difference through donations and fees. In an uncertain economy, some Division III leaders are starting to question whether the overall costs of all the new facilities outweigh their benefits. The building boom has accelerated even at smaller colleges scrambling to hook high-performance athletes. Among the nearly 50 new athletics facilities known to be completed over the past five years, 14 were on campuses of Division III colleges. The average cost of those structures was approximately $20-million.