I consider myself an avid sports fan. I love football, am a fair-weather basketball fan, follow golf, love to snowboard, date a tennis player, watched my friends run cross country and track in high school and I even enjoy watching ice skating. However, I don’t even come close to being as much of a fan of sports as many CU students. And if I am disappointed with the athletic department, I have a feeling some other people might be too.
Let me list for you the varsity sports that CU offers: men’s and women’s basketball, men’s and women’s golf, cross country, football, skiing, soccer, women’s tennis, track and field and volleyball. Now let me list you the varsity sports that our biggest Big 12 rival, Nebraska, supports: men’s and women’s gymnastics, men’s and women’s basketball, men’s and women’s golf, men’s and women’s tennis, football, soccer, volleyball, cross country, wrestling, swimming and diving, track and field, baseball, softball, bowling and rifle. Do you see the problem?
To me, this is embarrassing. As a Division I Big 12 school, we should be able to offer just as many sports as the rest of the schools offer. Okay, so maybe rifle and bowling is asking too much, but I think it is preposterous that we don’t have a hockey team and maybe even more outrageous that we don’t have a baseball team. Isn’t it sad that Colorado’s flagship institution can’t recruit some of the states’ best athletes because we don’t even have a team for them to play on?
It hasn’t always been this way. As recently as last year we had a men’s tennis team; however, because of a disastrous deficit in the athletic department’s budget, Athletic Director Mike Bohn decided to cut the team. Baseball and wrestling were eliminated in 1980 because of another budget issue.
Many people might argue that even though we lack a significant amount of varsity sports teams, we make up for it in the amount of club teams we offer. While we have no shortage of club sports, it’s a crying shame that these talented players have to pay high fees to participate in their sport and don’t have the opportunity to take advantage of the benefits varsity competition could offer. Take the men’s club hockey team, for example. At times throughout the season they were ranked number one in the country. And last time I heard, the club Ultimate Frisbee team was ranked second in the nation behind the University of Wisconsin. Just think how many more national championships CU would have the chance to contend for if our talented club sports were varsity sports. Think how many more flags could be hung in the Coors Events Center, seeing as football and basketball won’t be bringing home any national championships any time soon.
The source of this embarrassing problem is money. There are two reasons the athletic department has no money to support more varsity sports. Number one is because we pay ridiculously large amounts of money to our football and basketball coaches (which isn’t necessarily uncommon among other schools, however given that deficit that we are facing $800,000 a year for a basketball coach and $850,000 for a football coach, which may be a bit excessive).
Number two is because the two moneymaker sports don’t make money. This, to me, is even sadder. I completely understand that no one in their right mind feels like spending $50 to go see a football team lose for the tenth time in a season. I was at all those games, I know how absolutely terrible we were. But still, have some pride in you school and some faith in your new coach. Let me just say that if Dan Hawkins can recruit a Boise State team that eventually went on to beat Oklahoma in the Fiesta Bowl under a different coach, he can do it here.
I went to a few basketball games this season as well. (Remember, this is not my favorite sport out there and I previously described myself as a fair-weather fan.) The scene I lay my eyes on was the most pathetic I had ever seen. More people attended the girl’s basketball games in my high school than go to men’s basketball games here. But once again, next year is a new year and have some faith in our new coach, Jeff Bzdelik. Just like Hawk, if Bzdelik can do it at Air Force, he can do it here.
So, while there is not much we can do in terms of how much the athletic department plans on spending on quality coaches, we can show pride in our school and our athletic teams by attending football and basketball games and supporting the athletic department’s budget. Then maybe we can gain back our men’s tennis team and maybe even that bowling team somewhere down the road (after we get a hockey and baseball teams, of course). All I ask is that we don’t let our embarrassing athletic department continue to stain the reputation of this great institution.
