Qunnipiac Adds Rugby and Golf

The AP is reporting that Quinnipiac University filed its court-mandated Title IX compliance plan in federal court, in which it announced its decision to keep women's volleyball through 2011-12, s well as to add golf and rugby in order to balance women's athletic opportunities with men's. Quinnipiac will also retain its competitive cheer team -- renamed "stunts and tumbling" -- even though these opportunities do not (yet) count towards the university's Title IX compliance under the district court's recent ruling.

Qunnipiac's choice to add rugby is an interesting one. The NCAA designated rugby an "emerging sport" in 2002, as part of its initiative to support colleges' efforts to add athletic opportunities for women. The emerging sport designation means that sport will obtain national championship if 40 schools (across all three divisions) add the sport by 2012. In the meanwhile, opportunities added in that sport count toward NCAA requirements, as well as enjoy the presumption of counting as a varsity opportunity for Title IX purposes. Emerging sport status has successfully launched women's championships in sports like ice hockey and rowing, but rugby may not be following the same path. Though there is a widespread interest in rugby among female students, there is less interest from within the sport, which has a strong tradition of independence, to submit to institutional control. As a result, rugby has made slow progress towards the "4o by 2012" benchmark. By my count, Quinnipiac is only the sixth school overall, and the second in Division I, to add rugby as a varsity sport. If rugby loses its emerging sport status in 2012, Quinnipiac could potentially have two women's teams (stunts & tumbling and rugby) that do not count for Title IX purposes. We can only guess what effect this would have on the university's overall compliance strategy.

More details on the status of sand volleyball

So not too long ago we got wind that sand volleyball was not a shoo-in for emerging sport status; that there were some concerns. But we didn't get a lot of information about the situation. Then I read a piece by Graham Watson at ESPN.com where it seemed that sand volleyball was a go. In email correspondence with her, she told me that things were proceeding as planned, but that were a few details to be ironed out.
Now I have read that a second vote as to whether to approve sand volleyball for the NCAA's emerging sport designation will be taken in January. The second vote (the first was in April) is because there are issues over what exactly sand volleyball will look like--as in will it just be an additional season of indoor volleyball similar to indoor/outdoor track. And whether this is desirable. Also schools with indoor volleyball are concerned that they will lose recruits if they do not or cannot add sand volleyball.
In other words, stay tuned.
My concern, which I could not find echoed anywhere, is over sand volleyball as a revenue producer. Some believe the sport could quickly become a revenue-generating sport. And I think we all know how they intend to get those dollars--all we have to do is look at how sand volleyball and its female athletes are promoted at the Olympic and professional levels.

Sand volleyball recalled

Somehow we missed the news that sand volleyball, the newly named NCAA emerging sport, has been called back to the drawing board.
It seems San Diego State University had been planning to add sand volleyball along with women's lacrosse. SDSU must meet the gender equity standards established for all California state universities. In particular SDSU must raise the number of scholarships female student-athletes receive.
But it won't be doing it with sand volleyball (though lacrosse is still a go) because of concerns raised over the costs of sand volleyball (not sure the specifics of this concern) and that it would essentially turn into an additional season for indoor volleyball players and thus not in the true spirit of adding opportunities for women. And so the Division I Championships/Sports Management Cabinet has put on hold plans to develop, well a plan, for sand volleyball. The fate of sand volleyball will not be decided until next year.

Delaware State cuts wrestling

DSU announced yesterday that it is cutting its wrestling team due to economic issues, gender equity concerns, and issues around the team's academic performance.

The last is a problem plaguing several DSU teams and will likely result in some NCAA sanctions.
But it was the wrestling team that received the bad news. No word on the criteria used to make the decision, but it seems like there was very little department support for the team in recent years. Four coaches in the past four years, no dedicated facility and the increasing awareness that the team needed more than the school was able to provide. In the end, the department will save just under $40,000 by eliminating the team (not including, of course, projected costs to make improvements).
The Delaware wrestling community is taking the news hard given that now no state school will field a wrestling team. University of Delaware cut their team in the early 90s.
A local high school coach, Dicky Howell, spoke repeatedly of the lack of institutional support for the team and the student-athletes but turned around and blamed Title IX anyway citing the loss of wrestling teams since the passage. But as many of us know, and as Donna Lopiano reiterated last week in her talk at Western New England College, wrestling's demise isn't because of Title IX. It just is not as popular of a sport any more. There are certainly pockets of interest but other sports have overtaken it in terms of participation. And with the increasing emphasis on specialization at earlier and earlier ages, less popular sports see an even sharper decrease in participation. Maybe more kids would wrestle if they weren't playing soccer or lacrosse year-round.
And, of course, we are only speaking of men's wrestling. Women's wrestling seems to be growing. It remains to be seen how the sport, which the NCAA still has not recognized as an emerging sport, grows in the coming years.

Flip-flops, Part II

The news that the NCAA has named sand volleyball has created some discussion--and concerns. With the economy in the toilet and so many athletic departments struggling, some are wondering how sand volleyball is going to get started. And it's true that discussions such as facilities and scholarships need to happen. But they need to happen whenever there is the possibility of adding a team--men's or women's. Discussions about building multi-million dollar stadiums are happening right now as many schools consider adding football in an attempt to raise revenues.
And we have to remember that this new designation is not a requirement. All it means is if schools are considering adding a sport, this is one of the options.
I also discovered that sand volleyball is going to be played in the spring. This opens the door to indoor players transitioning to outdoor in the spring as well as coaching staffs if a school does not want to seek out new coaches. But the hitch to this is that indoor coaches do their recruiting in the spring. So there may be some scheduling issues.
Also sand volleyball will be like professional and Olympic beach volleyball in that it will be played in teams of two. This still leaves open the issue of scoring. Will it be like wrestling and tennis in which there are individual (or duo in this case) contests and these wins contribute to an overall team score.
Still unresolved--uniforms. Good to see others have concerns over this:
...it remains to be seen how a game that banked on sex appeal will translate to the collegiate sports world.

Break out the flip-flops!

The NCAA has approved "sand volleyball" as an emerging sport. (That's beach volleyball for all you with quizzical looks on your faces; they are calling it sand volleyball to appeal to landlocked institutions.) Competition is slated to begin in the 2010-11 school year.

I did not see anything on the format (2-person as in the Olympics? or more?). What season will they play in? Same as indoor volleyball? Will there be a lot of overlap between indoor and sand players?

Or the uniforms. Are bikinis going to be the norm? Are they going to be required? Female beach volleyball players are probably one of the most sexualized groups of female athletes out there in part because they don't have to go out of their way to pose in skimpy outfits, they play in skimpy outfits.

A few years ago I heard a good presentation about indoor volleyball uniforms worn by women (the short shorts and tight tops) and I am sure this will be a popular topic of inquiry at future academic conferences.

Changing emerging sports

The NCAA has been meeting this past week on a myriad of issues, including women's emerging sports. Beach volleyball (which they are calling sand volleyball in an attempt to get greater interest; so if we call ice hockey frozen sheet of water hockey it could become, by this logic, less regional?) was up for consideration as an emerging sport but it did not receive the 2/3 votes required for such a distinction. It does appear though that it will be added in April after the requisite comment period when the vote only requires a simple majority.
Voted off the list of emerging sports were archery, synchronized swimming, badminton, and team handball.
My question, of course, is: when are they going to start talking about wrestling??