Wiedmer: UTC women's crew a better idea for later

Megan Patrick, assistant coach for the University of Alabama's women's varsity rowing team, arranges oars on a hill at Ross's Landing in preparation of the 2012 Head of the Hooch meet.
Megan Patrick, assistant coach for the University of Alabama's women's varsity rowing team, arranges oars on a hill at Ross's Landing in preparation of the 2012 Head of the Hooch meet.

My esteemed colleague David Cook recently wrote a fascinating column concerning how a women's rowing team could theoretically do much to solve the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga's continuing Title IX woes.

At first glance, it makes perfect sense. It easily could add as many as 30 female athletes to the UTC athletic department's numbers, an addition that could do much to shrink the gap that currently exists within an athletic department that includes 211 male athletes to just 145 female ones on a campus that's 55 percent female overall.

Beyond that, as Cook noted, Chattanooga is gaining a national reputation as an outdoor paradise. A river runs through it. Mountains surround it. A competitive crew team seems almost a requirement, especially given the outrageous success of the Head of the Hooch regatta that brings both money and prestige to our city each autumn.

And to top it all off, the school has a club crew team, complete with shells, oars and a boat house. Given such advantages, how could UTC not afford to field a women's crew team?

"We'd love to," said UTC athletic director David Blackburn, who's lost much weight and sleep of late dealing with the backlash from the school's decision to cut men's indoor and outdoor track. "But it would cost millions and we don't have it."

When it comes to money, UTC never has had it. Never. Ever. It's one very large reason why it's pretty much run afoul of Title IX guidelines since Title IX guidelines first changed intercollegiate athletics forever in the late 1970s.

This is not to criticize the spirit of Title IX. Much to the good, Title IX legally leveled the playing field for women everywhere who had the desire and athletic ability to earn athletic scholarships. No more traveling in aging, un-air-conditioned vans when men in the same sport were flyin' and stylin'. Of course, UTC's men were never much better off than the women. Both were broke. Still are.

Only the Department of Education and the Office of Civil Rights no longer are in the mood to allow the school to use poverty as an excuse. They want positive trends. They want results. Yesterday.

Or as chancellor Steve Angle wrote to frustrated track supporters a week ago today: "UTC was put on notice in 1993 that we need to improve gender balance in intercollegiate athletics. We are nearing the end of a five-year improvement plan and have actually gone in the wrong direction since the plan was formulated."

You never want to go in the wrong direction where the government is concerned. As Blackburn has noted more than once in recent weeks, "They can withhold millions from you."

And when you're already basically broke, lost millions can all but put you out of business. Not that suggestions on how to keep men's track seem all that wrong. It does seem both logical and within the noble framework of teamwork that the football program do without five of its 95, since it only scholarships 63, to help men's track. It also doesn't seem selfish to ask wrestling to get along without two or three of its 36. Especially when the men's track team is posting the highest GPA in the country of any team in any sport.

But keeping men's track would still mean adding female athletes. And paying for them. And not just scholarships, but health insurance, athletic trainers, travel money. Possibly an extra coach or two.

Nor would it be just for a year or two or four. To permanently escape the Title IX wrecking ball, you've got to have the aforementioned millions in place that UTC doesn't have. It can't merely be several hundred thousand dollars worth of pledges. It's got to be money in the bank.

"It's complex," Blackburn said Tuesday. "First, we want to be both compliant and competitive. We want to give our athletes a chance to win. Second, one aspect of Title IX relates to grant-in-aids, and we're actually better with that on the female side than the male side. We're looking hard at ways to add a female sport, but we also want to make sure we stay in line with grant-in-aids when we do that."

So how expensive would rowing be, especially since a club team already is in place? First of all, to satisfy Title IX guidelines, scholarships, coaches, equipment, insurance and so forth must be provided by the school.

Let's say the school funds 12 scholarships a year to be spread over 30 rowers. Let's further say the split is eight in-staters to four out-of-staters. In-state is around $14,000 a year. Out-of-state is $32,000 per. That comes out to more than $240,000 in new expenses per year without figuring in the equipment, coaches, travel or anything else that would be required for varsity status complying with Title IX guidelines.

"And we're in the middle of a campuswide budget reduction," Blackburn added.

That's especially terrible news when a single new eight-person crew shell can cost more than $30,000 and a single wooden oar can run more than $200. Even if the club team sold equipment to the school, at some point new equipment would need to be purchased.

There's also the Southern Conference to consider. At least four schools are expected to add women's lacrosse in the next year or two. UTC will be encouraged to join that movement.

"We are actually looking intently at a number of sports," he said. "We just have to find a way to pay for it. It's just not as easy as throwing a boat in the water."

Especially when that boat costs at least $30,000 and you're supposed to be reducing costs rather than adding to them as the government watches your every move.

Contact Mark Wiedmer at mwiedmer@timesfreepress.com.

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