Row Town USA is in danger

YellowSnow · June 16

People forget @haie that I have good sources on this stuff.

https://www.seattletimes.com/sports/uw-huskies/row-town-usa-is-in-danger-after-house-settlement-says

BleachedAnusDawg · June 16

Less than two weeks after coaching the Washington men's rowing team to a second straight national title — and the 21st all-time — coach Michael Callahan said he believes the program could be facing "a 100-year storm" in the wake of the approval of the House settlement that allows schools to directly give up to $20.5 million to student-athletes.
Said UW women's rowing coach Yaz Farooq: "I feel supported by the University of Washington, and I know that they are looking out for us, but this is such a time of immense change in college sports that Row Town USA (Seattle) is in danger."
"At this point, with the settlement taking place just last Friday and people still trying to figure out the new rules and what they mean, it's like rowing in the fog," Callahan said.
"Everyone's trying to get clarification on all the rules," Callahan said. "I think we're at the point where every time you make a decision, there's the next 100 questions that need to be answered. It's like any decision, there's a lot of intended consequences, and a lot of unintended consequences."
None of the $20.5 million UW can give to its athletes is expected to go to men or women rowers at UW. In addition, both programs will have their roster sizes trimmed down.
Callahan said he has been asked to trim his roster from 58 the past two years to 44 to reduce the program's budget. The Husky women's team had 101 on its roster last season. The new roster limit as part of the settlement is 68.
Those limits are expected to reduce opportunities for walk-ons — long a big part of both UW programs — and it was one of the main points Farooq emphasized in a letter she sent to judge Claudia Wilken before she approved the House settlement.
Meanwhile, the number of scholarships for women's rowing has increased from 20 to 68, but Farooq is not expecting the university to give her team any more than the 20 it has now.
Texas, which finished third in the NCAA championships earlier this month, one spot ahead of UW, has announced it will allot the limit of 68 scholarships to its women's team. Michigan announced recently that it is increasing fall scholarships by 82, so Farooq said she is expecting the Wolverines women's rowing team to add scholarships as well.
"Our team is directly threatened by the fact that our competitors are announcing that they're going to dramatically increase scholarships," Farooq said. "We could be irrelevant in a matter of two years."
One of the consequences of the House settlement is that, while football and basketball programs certainly benefit from the House settlement, it seems likely to hurt the programs that are not considered revenue-makers.
"It certainly isn't helping us," Callahan said.
How much will it hurt the program?
"Time will tell," he said. "But that doesn't mean you can't find solutions."
Callahan said the Huskies have had 14.5 scholarships to give each year, and he said they are typically spread among 30 to 40 rowers. He said he has been told that number will stay the same, but wants the program to be prepared for possible cutbacks by having those scholarships endowed by boosters of the program.
"I don't think anyone can predict how the rules will go, and I think this is one of the reasons why the men's rowing program has this massive urgency to endow our scholarships," Callahan said. "We've always had the Seattle community and our alumni supporting us, and we're going to need the community going forward.
"If we're starting to pay student-athletes over $20 million a year, the athletic department might have to make hard, dark, draconian decisions, and we want to be in a place to safeguard against that. I want to be a solution for (UW athletic director) Pat Chun and the entire athletic department. I want to make sure, financially, that we have other alternatives besides multimedia deals and conference deals."
Chun is at a conference of athletic directors this week and was not available for comment.
Farooq is also calling for the community to step up and help her program, through endowments to the program, scholarships also through NIL (name, image and likeness) deals with her team's student-athletes.
"I think the NIL piece of this has to be our creative solution in this critical time, because that is the only way that we're going to be able to bring in these top athletes who are going to have scholarship offers elsewhere when we're out of scholarships," she said.
Farooq said companies often inquire about hiring rowers and noted that they can now do that while the athletes are in school without breaking the rules.
"My hope would be that they would see the value of what the rower can bring to their business, but also that they're able to help the individual athletes on our team, and that they're able to support our team directly in a way that will help our team be competitive immediately."
Both Husky coaches take solace that the rowing community has come through in the past in times of need for the sport.
"Look back to when the Boys on the Boat needed to go to the (1936) Olympics, the community of Seattle raised the money to help them go instead of sending the runner-up school," Farooq said. "When men's rowing was in danger in the past, the University of Washington actually sent coaches to other institutions to ensure that the sport stayed alive."
Said Callahan: "I'm hoping the message is out to our community that this is a time, if you value this program and what it can do for young people in our university, to back it. ... Maybe what happens is we really rally and we get a lot of support, which we always have."

BleachedAnusDawg · June 16

Why do the women rowers get more scholarships than the men? Is that to balance things out w/other sports due to Title IX?

Tequilla · June 16

Reading about the need for NIL for rowers is just comical to me … how many Olympic swimmers are notable "NIL athletes" with any kind of material known endorsement deal to the general public?

Endowing the scholarships seems like a good direction and should work well with the elitist world of rowing (sorry Yellow Piss … I'm talking about the supporters not the rowers themselves)

When you hear Texas driving a shit ton of scholarships it isn't because they give a shit about rowing per se but it's because their athletic department has so much money they have to spend it somewhere

YellowSnow · June 16

https://hardcorehusky.com/discussion/comment/2079408#Comment_2079408

TYFYS

YellowSnow · June 16

https://hardcorehusky.com/discussion/comment/2079413#Comment_2079413

NIL outside of athletes who have actual star power on which business would have REAL ROI- e.g., Caitlin Clark, Caleb Williams, etc. - is comical. Almost all of it is pay for play.

The issue right now is that the endowment only pays about 20% of the cost of running the Men's program including scholarships. The endowment needs to be like $70 million for men's rowing to not require any AD funding.

YellowSnow · June 16

https://hardcorehusky.com/discussion/comment/2079412#Comment_2079412

Men's rowing while being a varsity sport (hi @UW_Doog_Bot ) told the NCAA to F.O. in the early 1900s and never joined. The Men's scholarships (there are 14 of them) are privately funded and don't come out of the AD budget. Women's rowing is NCAA and their scholarships are paid for my the AD and count towards Title IX.

haie · June 16

Women's rowing probably has some major hurdles.

Men's rowing isn't going anywhere

Source: vibes from getting drunk and high and watching TBITB

YellowSnow · June 16

https://hardcorehusky.com/discussion/comment/2079461#Comment_2079461

It's a lot more complicated than vibes.

We need Clooney to write us a check for like $50,000,000.

PurpleThrobber · June 16

It was so much simpler when the crew house was used for selling coke and players were paid under the table.

I miss the 80s so much.

YellowSnow · June 16

https://hardcorehusky.com/discussion/comment/2079488#Comment_2079488

It was simpler times.

Although I think the early 90s would have been the peak time to be a UW.

whlinder · June 16

So women will have funding but will be noncompetitive due to scholarships, and the men won't have funding.

Go Huskieieies!

haie · June 16

https://hardcorehusky.com/discussion/comment/2079504#Comment_2079504

You guys really think that the AD will let that happen? For mens rowing?

They'll drop other sports for men's rowing. That's not even a debate.

Tequilla · 7:04AM

https://hardcorehusky.com/discussion/comment/2079427#Comment_2079427

Better start reaching out to Olympic Federations to support

YellowSnow · 4:44PM

https://hardcorehusky.com/discussion/comment/2079631#Comment_2079631

UW Rowing is basically a training camp for the national teams of the UK, NZ, Australia, and Canada. It's sad, but true. We sold our soul to the devil to not lose to CAL.

I've always been conflicted about this aspect of the sport and all the rah, rah, Boys in the Boat stuff.

Tequilla · 6:58PM

I don't care if we sell out and all of that stuff … just saying that if we're needing funding that the national teams should be kicking in some money for our heavy lifting

BTW, I also think this is true for most sports because without the role that college sports plays where is the NFL, MLB, etc. going to get their players

YellowSnow · 7:12PM

https://hardcorehusky.com/discussion/comment/2079742#Comment_2079742

I still don't believe Colleges and Universities should be running professional sports organizations, but here we fucking are.

Tequilla · 7:16PM

Can't put the genie back in the bottle

RaceBannon · 7:16PM

Pro football started because college football was so popular

People wanted to see Red Grange after he allegedly graduated

YellowSnow · 7:31PM

https://hardcorehusky.com/discussion/comment/2079750#Comment_2079750

When some loud bragger tries put me down and says his school his great…

Howdy, Stranger!

Quick Links

Row Town USA is in danger

Comments