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<b>Jones</b>
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Mitchell Lofstedt stood underneath the doorway leading into an athletics office at Roseburg High recently with a look of assurance no school but Southern Oregon University could provide.
But before Lofstedt, a three-time state champion, signed a letter of intent to wrestle in Ashland, he folded his arms and shook his head in disgust — he’d just been asked if he would have considered the University of Oregon’s wrestling program had it not been cut.
“It wasn’t an option,” Lofstedt said. “And it’s a shame what they did.”
It’s been nearly a year since Oregon’s program was cut, and it didn’t take long before the issue was hastily placed on the back burner by people who really never cared about the sport. Oregon’s athletic department promoted the new baseball team like mad — “replacing” became the perfect euphemism for real words, like “abandoning,” “snubbing,” “eliminating.”
Then, Arizona State’s program was cut Tuesday.
Collegiate wrestling programs, it seems, are dispensable, and they’re becoming endangered. The excuse in Tempe, Ariz., was that “economic realities” made the school drop its program, effective immediately.
Now, Oregon State and Stanford stand shakily as the only schools left in the Pacific-10 Conference with wrestling teams, and nobody is holding their breath.
The emotionally detached higher-ups in their suits and expensive cars and the hypersensitive rule makers of the NCAA are ruining the purity of athletics.
Why? Because the NCAA’s scale of justice tips toward what is “revenue gaining”, and not what is right. And when accountability becomes further skewed under the cloak of Title IX misconceptions, the only remaining certainty, it seems, is the immortality of collegiate football and men’s basketball.
“People who’ve helped raise money keep meeting demands and (athletic departments) keep coming up with something else,” Roseburg wrestling coach Steve Lander said. “To me, they’re just excuses.”
If you’re listening, Pat Kilkenny, give credence to this: The feeling statewide by many high school wrestlers is sheer devastation.
“There are already so few Division I programs, and now to lose one in your state and another in the Pac-10, there are a lot of kids who grow up wanting to be Ducks or Beavers,” Lander said.
These cuts aren’t recent phenomena either. Cody Parker, a Roseburg graduate, wrestled at Oregon for two years before transferring to Fresno State. But in 2006, the program was given the pink slip. Parker had to transfer to Cal Poly.
As for a solution? How about divvying up budgets better, listening to people like former Oregon coach Ron Finley and working together?
“It just seems like they could come up with a solution,” Lander said.
Arizona State also cut the swimming and tennis teams. It’s a move that might save them $1.1 million a year and lose them even more respect.
• You can reach sports reporter Dan Jones by e-mail at djones@nrtoday.com, or by phone at 957-4219.
But before Lofstedt, a three-time state champion, signed a letter of intent to wrestle in Ashland, he folded his arms and shook his head in disgust — he’d just been asked if he would have considered the University of Oregon’s wrestling program had it not been cut.
“It wasn’t an option,” Lofstedt said. “And it’s a shame what they did.”
It’s been nearly a year since Oregon’s program was cut, and it didn’t take long before the issue was hastily placed on the back burner by people who really never cared about the sport. Oregon’s athletic department promoted the new baseball team like mad — “replacing” became the perfect euphemism for real words, like “abandoning,” “snubbing,” “eliminating.”
Then, Arizona State’s program was cut Tuesday.
Collegiate wrestling programs, it seems, are dispensable, and they’re becoming endangered. The excuse in Tempe, Ariz., was that “economic realities” made the school drop its program, effective immediately.
Now, Oregon State and Stanford stand shakily as the only schools left in the Pacific-10 Conference with wrestling teams, and nobody is holding their breath.
The emotionally detached higher-ups in their suits and expensive cars and the hypersensitive rule makers of the NCAA are ruining the purity of athletics.
Why? Because the NCAA’s scale of justice tips toward what is “revenue gaining”, and not what is right. And when accountability becomes further skewed under the cloak of Title IX misconceptions, the only remaining certainty, it seems, is the immortality of collegiate football and men’s basketball.
“People who’ve helped raise money keep meeting demands and (athletic departments) keep coming up with something else,” Roseburg wrestling coach Steve Lander said. “To me, they’re just excuses.”
If you’re listening, Pat Kilkenny, give credence to this: The feeling statewide by many high school wrestlers is sheer devastation.
“There are already so few Division I programs, and now to lose one in your state and another in the Pac-10, there are a lot of kids who grow up wanting to be Ducks or Beavers,” Lander said.
These cuts aren’t recent phenomena either. Cody Parker, a Roseburg graduate, wrestled at Oregon for two years before transferring to Fresno State. But in 2006, the program was given the pink slip. Parker had to transfer to Cal Poly.
As for a solution? How about divvying up budgets better, listening to people like former Oregon coach Ron Finley and working together?
“It just seems like they could come up with a solution,” Lander said.
Arizona State also cut the swimming and tennis teams. It’s a move that might save them $1.1 million a year and lose them even more respect.
• You can reach sports reporter Dan Jones by e-mail at djones@nrtoday.com, or by phone at 957-4219.
