Stanford cuts 11 sports, Ivy League cuts football and all fall sports, and Ohio State ends voluntary workouts … where are college sports heading?

Stanford football

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… Stanford eliminated some programs that had won 20 

national titles and had led to 27 Olympic medals

Where are college sports going to be in a few months? That is an interesting question. Many schools are cutting sports, including Stanford’s elimination of 11 sports for the 2021-22 season. 

Add to that Ohio State’s shutting down seven of its voluntary workouts programs on campus and the Ivy League’s shutting down all of its fall athletics activities, and you know that college athletics is in trouble. 

Football is the immediate concern because of the money that it generates, but that is not where all of the focus is. Many athletes and coaches have built their programs to the stage where they want to excel, and to see their opportunities go by the boards is disappointing and frustrating. 

Where is the future?

As an article this week in Sports Illustrated indicated,

Ohio State, which fields more varsity athletic teams than any school in the nation, paused voluntary workouts for seven programs after an undisclosed number of positive COVID-19 tests, joining a growing list of schools to halt efforts to bring back sports. Earlier, the Ivy League announced that it will play no varsity sports for the rest of the calendar year—maybe they’ll try to move the fall sports to spring 2021, but there are no guarantees. And before both of those dispiriting decisions arrived, Stanford dropped this stunner: the preeminent all-sports athletic program in America is dropping 11 varsity programs after the 2020–21 season ends.

The Ohio State and Ivy League developments tell you where we are in college athletics—adrift, lacking answers and failing to gain ground on a relentless pandemic. The Stanford development tells you where we’re going if the current trends continue—toward the economic obliteration of college sports as we know them.

Pat Forde, “Stanford Cuts and Ivy League's Fall Sports Decision Are Just 

the Beginning for College Athletics,” Sports Illustrated, July 8, 2020

Stanford one of premier athletic programs

What was difficult to understand was that Stanford eliminated some programs that had won 20 national titles and had led to 27 Olympic medals. At the root of it is cost,

A gap in resources widened by the coronavirus pandemic is leading Stanford University to cut 11 varsity sports from the school's athletics program in 2021, the school announced Wednesday.

The school says because of the costs associated with running 36 varsity sports teams, the athletics program has been carrying an economic deficit for years -- and the pandemic exacerbated the financial burden.

The Cardinal sports teams to be eliminated are men's and women's fencing, field hockey, lightweight rowing, men's rowing, co-ed and women's sailing, squash, synchronized swimming, men's volleyball and wrestling.

Allen Kim and David Close, “Stanford cuts 11 varsity sports programs 

as the pandemic worsens finances,” CNN, July 8, 2020

The open letter sent out by the administration outlined the dilemma,

One of Stanford’s great sources of pride is our intercollegiate athletics program. Over the course of our storied history, through innumerable days of challenge, triumph and joy, our student-athletes have set the standard for exceptional achievement in both academics and athletics. Cheering on the Cardinal is an integral part of life at Stanford, and the commitment and dedication of our student-athletes serve as an inspiration for fans and followers well beyond The Farm.

As you may know, Stanford currently offers more varsity sports than nearly every other Division I university in the nation. Our goal is to provide excellent support and a world-class experience for our student-athletes in the sports that we offer. Over time, however, providing 36 varsity teams with the level of support that they deserve has become a serious and growing financial challenge …

This is heartbreaking news to share. These 11 programs consist of more than 240 incredible student-athletes and 22 dedicated coaches. They were built by more than 4,000 alumni whose contributions led to 20 national championships, 27 Olympic medals, and an untold number of academic and professional achievements. Each of the individuals associated with these programs will forever have a place in Stanford’s history.

Marc Tessier-Lavigne, President, et. al., “An open letter to the Stanford community 

and the Stanford Athletics family,” Stanford News, July 8, 2020

The end of college sports as we know them?

The SI piece explains what the future may hold for college athletics,

The Ohio State and Ivy League developments tell you where we are in college athletics—adrift, lacking answers and failing to gain ground on a relentless pandemic. The Stanford development tells you where we’re going if the current trends continue—toward the economic obliteration of college sports as we know them.

Almost everyone will be eliminating sports. Absolutely everyone will be slashing budgets. Scholarships, educational opportunities and jobs will all disappear in large numbers.

If there is not a miracle turnaround of our dismal coronavirus testing numbers by Aug. 1, all FBS conferences could join the FCS Ivy League in delaying fall sports to the spring—and just hoping things work out then. (Because, trust me, there is no great plan for what to do in that scenario.) If we have a compromised football season, the financial repercussions will be awful. If we have no football season, the financial repercussions will be far worse.

Pat Forde, Sports Illustrated, July 8, 2020

More cuts will probably be announced

The reality for many schools is that the truth may be worse in September than it is right now. That is when the students are supposed to show up for class. Yet, with many of them struggling financially without summer jobs or with their parents still out of work. 

Colleges and universities are reliant upon tuition to make ends meet. Without students, that money dries up, and without it, more cuts will be necessitated,

Taken collectively, the college news of the day leaves this conclusion: We all knew COVID-19 is wreaking havoc upon athletics, and now we’re seeing how bad it can get.

Already, 56 varsity programs have been dropped this year at the NCAA Division I level. And a lot of schools are holding out hope for football to save them from adding more to that pyre. If Stanford, with all its success and willingness to try to be great at everything, is swinging a heavy blade, that could provide cover for dozens of other schools.

For a quarter century, Stanford has been the gold standard of Olympic sports. In 2019 the school won its 25th consecutive Learfield Directors' Cup for all-sports excellence, and it certainly would have won again this year if not for the pandemic shutdown. National champions and Olympians grow like the towering palm trees that line the entry to the school.

Yet the Cardinal targeted 11 varsity sports for elimination at the end of the 2020–21 season: men’s and women’s fencing, field hockey, lightweight rowing, men’s rowing, coed and women’s sailing, squash, synchronized swimming, men’s volleyball and wrestling. In competitive terms, the school spared most of its best sports—nothing that was lost should jeopardize Stanford’s Learfield Cup hegemony. 

But in human terms, 240 students and 22 coaches just had their lives turned upside down.

Pat Forde, Sports Illustrated, July 8, 2020

Ivy League and Stanford realize that academics trump athletics

As much as I enjoy college athletics as a former coach and a fan, I am first and foremost an educator who realizes that academics are much more important than athletics, so university endowments should not be used to shore up athletics, and those outstanding schools like Stanford and Harvard and Yale and the other Ivies and Patriot Leaguers and others that focus primarily on academics should be commended,

Stanford says 75% of its endowment money is earmarked for specific purposes by donors, and at a place like Stanford the purposes are overwhelmingly academic. (There are athletic endowments, including the head-coaching positions on many varsity teams.) You can’t just dip into the endowment bank account for whatever needs may arise on campus. Also, endowment spending is capped at five% per year, since the goal is to keep the university well-funded in perpetuity.

Given a yearly full cost of attendance price tag in the neighborhood of $75,000, a lot of Stanford students receive financial aid. Two-thirds of the annual endowment spending goes toward paying those need-based grants …

So, no, the sports tail does not wag the academic dog at places like Harvard, Princeton, Yale and Stanford. They don’t put 100,000 fans in the stands for football or 20,000 in the arena for basketball, nor do they aspire to. Hell, the Ivy League schools don’t even dole out athletic scholarships.

In times of crisis, we see that sports are even less important at these schools now than they used to be. The Ivy League has now led the way twice in shutting down sports—on March 10, it became the first conference to halt its basketball season; and now it is the most prominent conference to punt football to a later date.

Are they trend setters again, or outliers? Football is a different beast, and the Power 5 won’t give up on a fall season easily. But if Wednesday is any indication, the entire college enterprise is hurtling toward a very bad fall after a very bad spring.

Pat Forde, Sports Illustrated, July 8, 2020

Forde blames politicians and other Americans for this

An interesting close to Forde’s article is this, which is something that should be considered because of the approach that many in the country like politicians and others have taken in opposition to many of these measures. Maybe we are going to have a reckoning the likes of which we have not seen in almost a century,

One of the oldest aphorisms in sports is to respect your opponent. America didn’t respect COVID-19—not enough to stay quarantined and wear masks and do what it had to do. Complacency, arrogance and stubbornness didn’t get the job done, and now the increasingly costly bills for that disrespect are coming due.

Pat Forde, Sports Illustrated, July 8, 2020