When members of the American University men's tennis team were abruptly called to a meeting with athletic department officials last Thursday morning, junior Juancarlo Vazquez had a typical reaction for a college kid.
"I thought we were in trouble or something," Vazquez said.
As things turned out, Vazquez was right. The meeting was one of three scheduled that day to announce that American was eliminating the men's tennis, women's tennis and men's golf programs, effective next season.
"We had no idea this was coming, none," said Vazquez, the No. 1 singles player on the men's team, which has won three consecutive Patriot League titles. "The athletic director and assistant athletic director came in and told us they were cutting the program and that was it. We were in total shock. It just felt cold-blooded."
Joni Comstock, who in November 2003 became American's fourth athletic director since 2000, said the decision to eliminate the programs has been approved by university president Benjamin Ladner and the school's Board of Trustees and is final.
Ladner was out of town yesterday and unavailable to comment, and calls to American Chief of Staff David Taylor were not returned.
"It's a very difficult time for the student athletes, the staff and everyone connected with it," Comstock said. "It doesn't make it easier to accept, but the athletic department and the university felt we needed to take these steps to make the department stronger. Our responsibility is to use our resources wisely and function within our budget."
A rally was held last night on American's campus to protest the cuts of the three sports that involve 30 student-athletes this spring. American will honor the scholarships currently held by student-athletes as well as those promised to incoming recruits.
The school will be reduced to fielding 16 varsity sports (seven men's and nine women's) in NCAA Division I play next year, but will continue to offer 80 athletic scholarships.
American, which joined the eight-member Patriot League in 2001, has an athletic budget of between $7 million and $8 million and will funnel the money saved by the elimination of the three sports into its remaining programs, according to Comstock.
Including scholarships, salaries for coaches and operational costs such as travel and equipment costs, the combined budget for the three eliminated programs was approximately $518,500, with about $410,500 of that money earmarked for men's and women's tennis.
American does not field a women's golf team.
"The most frustrating thing is that we were never told that we were in trouble," said Julia Colarusso, a sophomore from Downington, Pa. "We weren't given a chance to raise funds to try and save the programs, and right now it's going to be hard for anyone to transfer to another school because it's in the middle of the season and the deadline for transfer applications has already passed at a lot of schools.
"This is a university we all love, but we've been given no forum to ask why this decision was made, how this decision was made and when this decision was made. The whole thing was done in such an unprofessional manner."
According to one athletic department source, the school considered eliminating the programs for several months, but Comstock -- whose office has been inundated with phone calls, e-mails and letters from athletes, parents and alumni -- said the school made the decision only recently.
"The university, unfortunately with the planning and budget cycle, we told the students as soon as a decision was made," Comstock said. "But I do realize that this is a challenging time for them."
The cuts at American, which has an undergraduate enrollment of 5,870 with students from 150 countries and all 50 states, come at a time when schools are finding it increasingly harder to hold down tuition costs and fund athletic programs, particularly non-revenue sports.
"Over the last 10 to 15 years it's really become more of a challenge, especially for schools with smaller enrollments, to fund athletic departments," said Patriot League Executive Director Carolyn Schlie Femovich, who was made aware of the cuts last week. "Of course, you'd always like to see it going the other way, to see schools adding sports rather than subtracting them, but we understand that American faced a difficult situation and has had to make some hard choices."
The last Patriot League school to drop a sport was Bucknell, which downgraded its wrestling program to club status in 2001. However, thanks to a private donation of $5.6 million from an alumnus in 2004, Bucknell reinstated wrestling and bolstered several women's programs.
While AU golf coach Josh Cupp is already in the process of trying to help his players find new schools, the men's and women's tennis teams have not given up hope for saving their programs.
"The main reason I came back to coach here was because I loved it so much and I had such a good experience," said men's tennis coach Kyle Bailey, a 2003 American graduate and former captain of the men's team. "I have a lot of pride in this program and felt we've been doing a great job so it's been tough. We're trying to fight this thing as hard as we can."
