Are the Feet Dragging

It has been three months since UT Arlington students voted in favor of football returning to campus by nearly 62 percent. Obviously, there's not going to be much movement in three months, but news has been scant to come out about the topic. 

I've spoken to a few people about the latest and unsurprisingly, the University is either taking a deliberate approach, or dragging its feet. I'm generally an optimist and want to believe the U is giving a good faith effort.

UTA President Jennifer Cowley was on record with the following quote:

Title IX requires that there be a sufficient number of women's sports seats, so the very first thing we need to do is to ask what it takes to expand our women's sports. So I've asked the Athletics director to evaluate some women's sports and come forward with recommendations around what we might do there.

What she is referencing is Title IX, the landmark legislation passed in the 1970's that dictate funding based on equality of both genders. Most people mistakenly believe Title IX requires a one for one scholarship for both women and men. It is actually a three-prong test where just one prong needs to be met.

The prongs are:

• one, athletics participation opportunities for both gendered students are proportionate to the undergraduate enrollment; 
• two, the school has a history and practice of women's sports program expansion; 
• three, the University is accommodating the interests and abilities of the under-represented sex.

That thinking of a one-for-one scholarship offering isn't a prong at all. And if it were, no school that has a football program would ever be in compliance. With 85 scholarships at the highest level and 63 at the lowest Division I subdivision, there's no other women's sport that comes close. 

Now also note, Title IX says nothing about scholarship, but rather participation. UTA, as with most non-football schools, is essentially compliant in all three prongs. I remember talking with then-Athletic Director Pete Carlon as a student (perhaps the best AD in school history), and he was proud of that fact. 

Football schools meet Title IX purely on prong two, adding women's sports every so often. That's why there's constantly a revolving door of new women's sports. Rowing, equestrian, beach volleyball and bowling are some of the most recent sports to be added. There's a name for newest of them, Emerging Sports. It has almost exclusively everything to do with meeting prong two. 

Some have argued that football helps meet prong three, as women are also interested in football, but others counter that Title IX deals exclusively with participation. I haven't seen anything concrete either way.

Now, for UTA, meeting the task set forth by the President shouldn't be hard. It is something that has been evaluated in the past, as I chronicled in this post, but didn't have the hard copy of at the time (thank you Gerry Mecca!!!).

In 2014/15, a study briefly mentioned women's soccer, but had scant details. Certainly nothing financial that would be beneficial. But it did seem to indicate just adding that sport would get UTA there.

But the study released in 2020 goes into further detail. After first saying UTA would be out of compliance in the proportionality prong, it then doesn't mention anything about the other two.

The report then goes to the possible sport additions and it mirrored something I've posted here before, most recently in this post. The first and seemingly most obvious is women's soccer. It then mentions swimming and diving, and finally beach volleyball.

It looks at emerging sports next, which don't offer official NCAA championships. However, much like UTA did in volleyball in the 1970's, getting in on the ground floor of a new sport could allow for a chance to be a dominant player in that sport. The two are acrobatics and tumbling followed by wrestling. It doesn't give a budget review for those sports but does breakdown participation in high schools within the state.

Now what is absent in the President's comments are anything regarding what the next steps are beyond that. Anyone who has a cursory knowledge of college sports likely knows Title IX will come into play. Look to UT Rio Grande Valley as an example of how I think this should be done. They packaged everything together in one campaign and came out guns blazing. I have a hard time thinking that people won't step forward in some capacity or another to resurrect the program. 

Lamar had record attendance when they resumed the sport. It has fallen as of late, but when you win nine games in four years and one winning season (at 7-5) out of eight, that tends to happen. But they drew over 16,000 that first year, 14,000 the second and 11,000 the third. UTA used to consistently beat Lamar in attendance in the 1980's. I suspect something similar would happen in Arlington.

My dream would be the color commentator for the team, as I suspect few have the broadcasting background, knowledge of the team's history and of the school. However, if that feat is not obtained, then I certainly will be a season ticket holder from day one. I would donate a small amount that I could afford either way, I can't be the only person connected with the U to do such. Now I will not be a mega-donor, but unless something is announced, will there be an opportunity for one?

What follows was almost enough for it's own post, and the paragraph above is a logical stopping point. But, why is this all important? In the current landscape of college sports, particularly at the Division I level of the NCAA, football programs are premier. 

Instinctively, UTA knows this already. The Sun Belt said adios to the Maverick Athletic Department due to no football, despite finishing first in points scored per sport in the Bubas Cup, the award for the best overall athletic department, and second four times in the nine years they competed. There were two fourth place finishes and the COVID year was a sixth. I throw that year out because UTA is a spring heavy sport, with eight of 15 total sports not scored that year. The baseball squad was looking particularly strong that year too. Even finishing sixth is a testament to the strength of the overall athletic department as UTA was still in the top half of the conference despite being two sports or more down.

But in the end, it didn't matter as the Mavericks didn't have a football team. Despite getting $1.2 million less than the football schools via conference payouts, the decision was made to boot out the non-football schools. Purely over football. UTA lost a home in a competitive, stable conference for all-sports due to not having a football program. 

Don't get me wrong. I like the Western Athletic Conference in its current iteration. If Texas State could somehow become a conference member, I'd be ecstatic, though that will never happen as it is. Renewing rivalry with Stephen F. Austin has been great. Abilene Christian and Tarleton State are reasonably close. UTRGV, while not as competitive overall, has sparked a couple of good moments this past year. Grand Canyon is a the class of the conference and holding it's own nationally in many sports. The three Utah schools have created a nice rivalry to watch. California Baptist seems on the upswing and competing similarly to Grand Canyon at the same time in their transition to Division I. And then there's Seattle...

But the instability of the WAC is evident in the football side of things. New Mexico State and Sam Houston left to play in a FBS conference this month. Tarleton has made no secret their desire for FBS. Rumor was that Sam, ACU, SFA along with Lamar came to the WAC as it was once an FBS conference and could use that to get back, so there's likely other schools looking at the same path as SHSU.

The WAC doesn't even sponsor the sport anymore, as the football schools essentially merged with the football-playing schools of the Atlantic Sun Conference. The newly-formed United Athletic Conference has made statements about wanting to go to FBS. If they do, the WAC is in trouble and UTA is right back where they started. The only reasonable home at that point, should they even stay DI, would be the Southland Conference, and it's severely under-performing all-sports offering. They are typically ranked at best 25th out of a maximum total of 32 DI conferences. At that point, UTA would be playing for conference titles amongst schools very few people care about. That poor of a ranking would mean poor seeds for any team that made their respective tournament and likely a one-and-done.

I rehash a lot of this to introduce this article from The Athletic. It chronicles the University of Central Florida's rise from Division III to FBS Power 5 conference. They started athletic play in the fall of 1969. They first fielded a football team in 1979. The were in Division II until joining DI in 1984. However, their football team continued to play in a lower level than the rest of their sports until making the I-AA level in 1990. Their first conference was the American South Conference, partially founded by Southland members that fled after UTA's football demise. The ASC merged with the Sun Belt in 1991. In 1992, they joined the conference currently known as the ASUN. Their football moved up to I-A in 1996 and played as an independent before joining the Mid-American Conference in 2002. All-sports then moved to Conference USA in 2005, then the American Athletic Conference in 2013, before getting that coveted P5 entry to the Big XII this month.

Now all that happened because of their football team's existence. A school UTA used to be head and shoulders above athletically until evening out in the 1980's and '90's, then surpassed them in the aughts. UCF battled hard times in its early days. One coach cut his salary in half to make it work. They played below their division to save on costs. They have won only four conference championships in 22 seasons playing in a conference, 6-8 in bowl games, 2-2 in the I-AA playoffs in six seasons and are an all-time 289-214-1. None of that is dominating. They have had some great moments over the years, but have had some poor ones too. 

Now I'm not saying this could be UTA. But considering the department's budget stabilized in the 1990's, right as UCF's rise was occurring, I'm not saying it couldn't have happened either. However, the main point is UCF went from a College nobody but some of the locals really knew, to a household name with a seat at the College Football Playoff money trough. UTA absolutely will never do that without a team.

But the main point is more so that UTA may not have a seat at any table except the kiddie table. With it's enrollment and location, if UTA had a team now, it would guarantee a spot at Conference USA. Had they started a team a couple of years ago, they'd still be in the Sun Belt. UTSA did and now they are in the AAC, right where UCF was before getting that P5 spot.

UTA is a comparable Athletic Department to Sam Houston. The Mavericks even have a better overall football facility now. They have guaranteed their athletic future is stable while UTA's is murky. All because they field a team (though their recent success doesn't hurt either).

So while fielding a women's team for Title IX is absolutely important and needs to be done, so is the impetus to field a team. The students called the play. Now it's time to execute it and get this department back where it belongs amongst its peers. Hopefully that is happening and right now, the most that has been leaked is a Title IX tidbit.