I pride myself on being the guy who knows everything about sports. In the middle of watching late-night “Sportscenter,” reading box scores and playing fantasy everything, I missed one big issue: Title IX. Up until a year ago, I had no idea what it was.
Regarding athletics, Title IX states that men and women will be given equal opportunity to participate in sports. It doesn’t require schools to offer the same sports for men and women, but institutions must offer the same number of scholarships to girls as they offer to boys.
This is important when discussing why schools don’t or can’t sponsor every sport. The U doesn’t sponsor men’s soccer, rugby, track or volleyball. Likewise, there are no Lady Ute field hockey, water polo or golf teams. It’s unfortunate, but it is what it is.
According to the National Collegiate Athletic Association’s website, Title IX is trying to “bring the disadvantaged gender up to the level up the advantaged group,” and that is the system that is in place. Much like the BCS in college football, you can fight it or get your local senator to fight it for you, but it’s not going anywhere.
Let’s say Utah had the ability, through awarding more scholarships or eliminating a sport, to add another male team. What should it be?
You could make the argument for a number of sports to get the nod, but it makes the most sense to have a male soccer team.
First of all, Utah has the facilities to house another soccer team. Ute Field is a great venue that was made specifically for soccer, and I’m sure the women wouldn’t mind sharing. Furthermore, having a men’s team would more than likely allow the school to add more seats to Ute Field, as it simply cannot hold the amount of people who attend games regularly.
Being able to play or compete in a conference is a big deal in college athletics. Sure, teams can be independent, but if that’s the case, schools are more often than not forced to travel farther to play games, and that in turn raises costs.
Because the Mountain West Conference does not recognize men’s soccer as a sport, teams have joined the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation. The MPSF is a league that allows Division-I schools the opportunity to have smaller sports. For example, Pac-10 power USC has its men’s water polo team associated with the MPSF.
This would be a natural fit for Utah, because the league already sponsors fellow MWC teams: UNLV, Air Force and New Mexico soccer.
The fact that more than 200 schools have a sponsored men’s soccer team is a big deal. This would allow the U to have options for games and help in recruiting. Although I love rugby, it is not recognized as a Division-I sport, which means it makes less sense to sponsor it over soccer.
You might be wondering why the above MWC teams have men’s soccer. The answer: They have sacrificed other sports. UNLV does not have a skiing team and New Mexico does not have a baseball team so they can have soccer.
ir Force has its own issues: Because it is a government-run military academy that has far more men than women enrolled, it more or less has special treatment. Air Force has many more male sports than women’s, which includes soccer, boxing, lacrosse, wrestling and ice hockey.
Because the Real Salt Lake soccer team is now well-established in the area, soccer would be the best bet if Utah could sponsor another sport.
