Men's Rowing poised to win 8th straight national championship
We need another in football.
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That all said, and not to take anything away from what Michigan has done, but they would be quite lucky to make the IRA petite finals most years (ie 7th-12th place).
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I think Washington might give a few scholarships, and maybe Cal too. But that's about it for IRA programs that award scholarships. The Ivies give generous financial aid and will get rowers admitted who would not otherwise get into the school, but the overwhelming majority of men in IRA programs don't get scholarships.
Just curious, is it typical to have one school with 11 boats/entries? And, is there anyway to watch the event??
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sculls possibly (boats where the rower(s) each row with 2 oars). The 4's and 8's are pretty much all sweep rowing, where each rower is assigned either a port or starboard oar.
This is getting ridiculous.
Michigan is going to have an indoor rowing facility within the next few years. Men's Rowing needs to be brought up to Varsity status already.
Who cares if the NCAA doesn't sponsor Men's Rowing? The IRA does and Wisconsin has Varsity rowing in their department.
It's time. Make it happen, Hackett. Will have to add a Women's sport. Add Sand Volleyball which officially becomes an NCAA sponsored sport next season.
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I wish. The cost is much higher than adding a Sand Volleyball team, most likely.
Since the NCAA counts Fencing as a coed sport in terms of their championship, I'm wondering if that would offset the addition of Men's Rowing.
THAT would be amazing. Michigan could resurrect their Fencing team that has been gone for over 80 years. It was only one of two sports ever dropped at Michigan.
Ok I'm biting, what was the other sport that was dropped in addition to fencing?
Synchronized Swimming.
When the NCAA began sponsoring women's sports in 1982-83, Michigan along with pretty much every other school decided to leave the AIAW for the NCAA. The NCAA didn't and still doesn't sponsor synchro, so Michigan just dropped their program.
Synchro was one of the original six women's Varsity sports at Michigan.
It was a pretty successful program in its short life. National runner-up in 1977 and 1978 with a two time All-American and AIAW Athlete of the Year in Ruth Pickett.
Upvote again, you should consider changing your screen name to Michipedia.
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I consider that an NCAA Gymnastics event, more than I do a single sport on its own. So does the athletic department in their record books.
+1 as I was going to make the same general comment as to why we are not at the Varsity level yet, especially with the new facilities coming on line. In addition, women's sand volleyball - what not to like about that! SFW image....
I would love to see us add women's hockey. It's an expensive sport, but I find it odd that Michigan doesn't have a team. A lot of girls play hockey in our state, we could have a good team in a hurry.
I may be wrong, but I've always thought there is only D1 women's rowing no men. NCAA.com only shows women's.
You're right, but just because it's not sponsored by the NCAA doesn't mean it can't be a varsity sport.
Wisconsin has Men's Rowing along with the Ivy League schools and others. Men's Rowing's governing body is the Intercollegiate Rowing Association.
They have been around since 1871.
Men's rowing is the oldest intercollegiate sport in America. The relationship between the NCAA and men's rowing is essentially non-existent because the "old guard" did not want anything to do with the NCAA. Varsity men's rowing at the premier programs (Washington, California, Wisconsin, the Ivy League institutions, the US Naval Academy, Syracuse, etc.) hold a lot of cachet within their respective athletic departments and within the university administration to the point where normally the athletic administration allows them to "do their thing".
That being said, with the introduction of women's rowing as an NCAA "Emerging Sport" in the mid-1990s, the women's side has grown and expanded very quickly to the point of surpassing their "brother" programs within their given athletic departments in terms of roster numbers, funding, staffing, scholarships, support, facilities, equipment, media attention, etc. Many men's programs are now starting to feel that they are expendable and in danger of being dropped. This will never happen with the premier programs, but has already happened with some lower level teams, and so we are starting to see a much more favorable view towards NCAA inclusion by coaches that previously were against it.
One great thing the NCAA has done for women's rowing is to give it structure, such as stratification by division as well as conference and/or regional championships for NCAA qualification. This alone has raised the understanding and importance of the sport by their athletic administrations and their university communities as well. These top women's programs are no longer competing at events like the Dad Vail Regatta, where you find a mix of programs competing against each other (DI, DII, DIII, club, varsity, scholarship, non-scholarship), all the while erroneously deeming itself a "national championship".
Traditions are very important in the sport of rowing, especially on the men's side, but some of these traditions have been to the detriment of the sport's development. It will be interesting to see where collegiate men's rowing goes over the next 15 - 20 years.
is geography. If Michigan wants to have a varsity program and join the IRA, it would have to move its men's rowing program to Ford Lake in Ypsi and build a boathouse there.
Right now, the men's program has a "boathouse" on Argo Pond, and the facilities are essentially identical to what Ann Arbor Huron and Ann Arbor Pioneer use for their rowing programs. It's really just a big shed with space to keep boats. There are no real training facilities there. And the men's program just got kicked out of its former space in the IM building where they did offseason training.
The biggest problem with Argo and the Huron River is that you can't lay out a 2000-meter sprint course on the river in Ann Arbor. I think the longest course that can be laid out at Argo is around 1300-1400 meters.
Ford Lake would accomodate an appropriate sprint course and would be fine for training. I believe that's where the UM women's program trains. But if UM wants to have a first-rate men's varsity program, it will have to build a boathouse there. The building alone (not including the land) would cost well over $5 million. And having a boathouse that far from campus is a real problem. Ask Yale, whose boathouse is a half-hour away from campus. Yale struggled forever and only revived its program when it hired one of the greatest coaches in rowing history. Yale's remote boathouse is a real problem for recruiting.
Even though the men's program deserves more, I think that recent AD decisions about facilities development across the department will preclude making the investment necessary to have a high-level men's rowing program.