Boise State Cuts Baseball, Women’s Swim And Dive Teams

COVID-19 has struck again as Boise State needs to save money and to do that it is cutting a pair of sports.

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Boise State To Cut Baseball, Women’s Swim And Dive Teams

Broncos are needing to slash its budget

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Gotta feel bad for these athletes

COVID-19 has forced a lot of NCAA schools to shave its budgets ranging from coaches and higher-ups taking pay cuts to help fund its department due to losses. Cutting salaries is not enough and the next step is to cut sports.

There have been many leagues that have dropped sports to save money and the first school within the Mountain West to drop sports is Boise State.

The Broncos are dropping baseball and the women’s swimming and diving team. This is a huge blow for baseball which was brought back after a 40-year hiatus, yet they were only able to play just a partial season in 2020.

In the 14 games, the Broncos were 9-5 and had 3,300 fans on opening night of this year’s campaign.

All of these scholarships will be upheld, which is nice, but the majority of these students went to Boise State to participate in their sport.

What is also missing from this is that men’s wrestling was dropped to bring in baseball so it is a double-whammy for those prior athletes who still might be on campus finishing up their degree to know their replacement sport has also been cut.

“This is one of the hardest decisions athletic departments have to make, but it comes at a time when we are facing the most serious financial challenge we have ever seen,” Boise State AD Curt Apsey said in the release. “Times like these are difficult for many people and we appreciate everyone who has supported these programs over the years, including our coaches, current and former student-athletes, donors, and fans. We take all these measures seriously, knowing that the long-term stability of our department must remain a high priority.”

Cutting these sports will save the university about $3 million, and it is probably needed with COVID-19 causing budget issues for schools across the country.

The Idaho Statesman obtained the operating costs for the swimming and diving team through an open records request and the average cost over the past three years of that program was $907,736 over the past three years.

Baseball had to cost more due to more athletes on the baseball team compared to swimming and diving, more equipment, and the new baseball field. Based on the swimming costs, baseball is just north of a $2 million per year sport to fund.

 

Could Baseball Return?

Nearly every time a sport is cut, there says to be a group to be in the fold to help fund and bring back the sport, and that is what D1Baseball’s Kendall Rogers is “hearing.”

It will take about $2 million to get the team back but there is also the issue of Title IX that the school needs to go by. Even if there is enough money for baseball, Boise State would need to match the athlete count for a women’s sport. Maybe if baseball has enough money, then the Broncos could come up with the near-million dollars for women’s swimming and diving or other female sports.

The odds of bringing back a cut program is slim but not impossible and this will be tough to do.

As of Thursday, there are already eight Boise State baseball players in the transfer portal.

 

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