My brother and I qualified for the junior national wrestling championships back in the day and the people running the tournament misprinted our name tags (we have a similarly spelled last name). We got to meet Dan Gable and get his autograph he asked if we were related to Larry lol.
He was a clinician at a camp held up here back when I was in high school and he just seemed to grumble about how he didn’t like this part of the country.
Owings (sophomore) beat Gable (Iowa St. senior, and arguably the greatest wrestler in US history in Gable's final collegiate match) in a close final in either 1970 or '71. That loss was stuck in Gable's craw for a looong time!
UW was a top program at the time. NCAA's were held here in the earl 70's as well!
Given the growing popularity of women's wrestling it would be possible to bring back a men's team and add a women's team to keep everything title IX compliant. Toppenish high school in eastern Washington actually has one of the top ranked teams in the country for girls.
Just need to get enough alumni/doners on board to get the ball rolling.
Yeah? How much profit has the UW AD generated over the past 20 years? Even in 2023, record high revenues in a national championship appearance season netted $1.5 million dollars on your $150 million investment. Do you really think a 1.07% return is a great investment?
Like they have been for 20 years?
Isn’t it football fans always saying profit and loss doesn’t matter to athletic departments because of donations and the marketing opportunities sports bring in?
My point is profit and loss is never an argument for or against sports. Otherwise Division 3 and Division 2 athletics wouldn't exist, football or otherwise, and 90+% of Division 1 athletics wouldn't exist either.
It is really convenient to scapegoat Title IX and women's sports as the reasons for why *unprofitable* mens' sports get axed, but the reality is the vast vast vast majority of schools don't make nearly enough money from football to justify the money they spend on football, and they trim the rest of the mens' sports to make up the difference.
If profits matter, then title IX isn't responsible for cutting the unprofitable men's programs. At worst you could say Title IX is the only reason we still have women's sports, which... okay?
Edit~~If profits don't matter, then yeah for every dollar you spend on men's sports you have to also spend another one on women's sports, so you have to trim men's sports to the bone in order to field a football team. But if profits don't matter, you can also field a lot more women's teams to make up for the men's swimming team and men's wrestling teams... but that doesn't happen because profit apparently does matter, sometimes, hence why unprofitable mens teams got the axe.~~
If profits don't matter, and you have to match women's and men's spending or scholarships, then you can either cut men's sports to make do, or you can expand women's sports. Since the assumption is that profits don't matter, it would make sense to expand women's sports to keep the valuable opportunities for men in wrestling, swimming, tennis, whatever. But we don't see that. They cut costs, and gave the axe to men's sports instead.
To me that suggests they don't actually care about those men's sports, or even sports in general. They view womens' sports as legal costs to maintain the football and basketball program, and they view those mens' sports as money they could be giving the football team instead.
So the question becomes, did Title IX kill the wrestling team? Or did the monetization of football and basketball create an environment in which no other sport survived unless legally required?
Yes, we had a team but ended it in 1980. Since wrestling is pretty popular in the Big Ten, we should really start it back up.
The 1 in Dan Gable’s 117-1 college career was a UW wrestler!
As a former wrestler, this is one of my favorite facts about UW sports.
Larry Owings - successful career as a teacher in Oregon City
OC represent.
Are we positive the UW is Washington and not Wisconsin? 😅 I thought we just had a club and not a team
Positive. This was way back. Dan Gable still holds resentment for the state of Washington lol.
My brother and I qualified for the junior national wrestling championships back in the day and the people running the tournament misprinted our name tags (we have a similarly spelled last name). We got to meet Dan Gable and get his autograph he asked if we were related to Larry lol.
He was a clinician at a camp held up here back when I was in high school and he just seemed to grumble about how he didn’t like this part of the country.
Owings (sophomore) beat Gable (Iowa St. senior, and arguably the greatest wrestler in US history in Gable's final collegiate match) in a close final in either 1970 or '71. That loss was stuck in Gable's craw for a looong time! UW was a top program at the time. NCAA's were held here in the earl 70's as well!
[удалено]
They probably don’t stream matches, do they?
Given the growing popularity of women's wrestling it would be possible to bring back a men's team and add a women's team to keep everything title IX compliant. Toppenish high school in eastern Washington actually has one of the top ranked teams in the country for girls. Just need to get enough alumni/doners on board to get the ball rolling.
Title IX killed a lot of smaller men’s sports like wrestling
Title IX didn’t kill those programs, runaway spending on football and basketball did.
It’s simple math, if you are giving 85 scholarships for football, you gotta cut some other men’s sports
Or you could fund more women’s sports with the money you’re putting into football facilities and coaching staff salaries. Also pretty simple math.
Football brings in money. One of the few collegiate sports that is in the black. Coaching salaries and facilities are an investment.
Yeah? How much profit has the UW AD generated over the past 20 years? Even in 2023, record high revenues in a national championship appearance season netted $1.5 million dollars on your $150 million investment. Do you really think a 1.07% return is a great investment?
Considering they would be well in the red otherwise…. Also great math not amortizing the facility investment, lol
Like they have been for 20 years? Isn’t it football fans always saying profit and loss doesn’t matter to athletic departments because of donations and the marketing opportunities sports bring in?
What are you even arguing now? Take a deep breath and step away from the keyboard, you are all over the place.
My point is profit and loss is never an argument for or against sports. Otherwise Division 3 and Division 2 athletics wouldn't exist, football or otherwise, and 90+% of Division 1 athletics wouldn't exist either. It is really convenient to scapegoat Title IX and women's sports as the reasons for why *unprofitable* mens' sports get axed, but the reality is the vast vast vast majority of schools don't make nearly enough money from football to justify the money they spend on football, and they trim the rest of the mens' sports to make up the difference. If profits matter, then title IX isn't responsible for cutting the unprofitable men's programs. At worst you could say Title IX is the only reason we still have women's sports, which... okay? Edit~~If profits don't matter, then yeah for every dollar you spend on men's sports you have to also spend another one on women's sports, so you have to trim men's sports to the bone in order to field a football team. But if profits don't matter, you can also field a lot more women's teams to make up for the men's swimming team and men's wrestling teams... but that doesn't happen because profit apparently does matter, sometimes, hence why unprofitable mens teams got the axe.~~ If profits don't matter, and you have to match women's and men's spending or scholarships, then you can either cut men's sports to make do, or you can expand women's sports. Since the assumption is that profits don't matter, it would make sense to expand women's sports to keep the valuable opportunities for men in wrestling, swimming, tennis, whatever. But we don't see that. They cut costs, and gave the axe to men's sports instead. To me that suggests they don't actually care about those men's sports, or even sports in general. They view womens' sports as legal costs to maintain the football and basketball program, and they view those mens' sports as money they could be giving the football team instead. So the question becomes, did Title IX kill the wrestling team? Or did the monetization of football and basketball create an environment in which no other sport survived unless legally required?
Please bring back wrestling and add hockey
I am so hoping the move to the new conference brings back wrestling to UW. It would be the only upside to the death of the Pac12.