The word “stunning” is overused in sports… but Wednesday’s news from Stanford University rates as stunning.
If you have read Trojans Wire the past few days, you know that we have begun to write about the history of the Olympics as connected to USC. The Trojans boast the most successful Summer Olympic university in the United States. The Trojans have more gold medals and overall medals than any other American university.
Not too far behind USC is Stanford… and at the 2016 Summer Games in Rio, the Cardinal won the gold and overall medal counts, besting USC (and California-Berkeley) by a small margin. Stanford joins USC, Cal, and UCLA as part of the Pac-12’s Olympic sports juggernaut. These four schools — by themselves — would represent one of the most successful Olympic “nations” in the history of the modern games dating back to 1896 in Athens. When you think of Olympic sports greatness, you think of these four schools… and in 2016 in Brazil, Stanford was number one.
With this in mind, stop and pause to absorb the enormity of this moment on Wednesday, when Stanford announced it was cutting 11 varsity sports:
Stanford, the gold-standard of broad-based athletic departments, and winner of 25 consecutive Directors' Cups, is cutting 11 of its 36 varsity teams. Just wow. https://t.co/XTnyHS7HI8
— David Teel (@ByDavidTeel) July 8, 2020
The 11 sports being cut: men’s and women’s fencing, field hockey, lightweight rowing, men’s rowing, co-ed and women’s sailing, squash, synchronized swimming, wrestling, and — most eye-popping of all — men’s volleyball.
One could make the point that Stanford had 36 varsity sports on its plate, an enormous number. Not too long ago, Texas — another school with enormous resources — fielded only 16 varsity sports with the express intent to pour resources into them and not have a bloated athletic program. Stanford and other schools wanted to take on the burden of fielding a large number of sports, so this could be seen by some as a modest, even inevitable, course correction. In other words: It’s not that big a deal when viewed this way.
But no: This is a very, very big deal.
Why? Start with the fact that this is Stanford, an elite institution by most if not all measurements, a school prestigious enough to be called by some “The Harvard of the West.”
If Stanford feels overextended to the point of unsustainability — regardless of whether you agree with its decision here — that itself is news. If Stanford feels it has to make significant cuts, imagine what less endowed schools are thinking (and will think).
Stanford’s endowment isn’t at Harvard’s ($41 billion) level, but it is still substantial: just under $28 billion. No, I’m not saying Stanford should have used the endowment to preserve these sports. I am emphasizing that Stanford has the resources to usher these programs through the pandemic, and then get to a place of greater stability once football (presumably) comes back under normal circumstances in 2021… but it chose not to.
As universities — bleeding on the balance sheet due to all the room and board and other revenue streams they won’t collect in the coming year — consider how to restructure, Stanford’s decision seems almost certain to have a domino effect on dozens of other schools (and sports) across the country.
An industry is rapidly changing before our eyes, and all of this increases the stakes relative to any attempt to play college football.
As we have been telling you in recent days, the time for college football leaders to make decisions on starting the season is rapidly approaching.
The tumult and upheaval coursing through America’s secondary educational institutions — in and beyond the sports world — mirror the tumult and upheaval happening throughout our economy and our country at large.