This weekend was Senior Day for the Men's Lacrosse team. Fittingly they defeated UNH and are having another strong season.
Unsaid in the facilities announcement and renewed commitment to baseball, was that Men's Lacrosse remains a club and will likely be a club for the foreseeable future. As baseball faltered and club Lacrosse thrived it seemed like a smart move would be to have the programs trade places with regards to scholarships and funding. But that's not happening. It is a BC thing, an ACC thing and a Title 9 dilemma.
Right now BC is ranked 10th among club teams and should make the club championship tournament. Let's hope they make it and win it all. Although it wouldn't be an NCAA Title, it would still be a big step forward for the team and BC Athletics.
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There would be almost no change in the scholarship situation as a result of dropping one and addin another. Per the NCAA, the maximum scholarships allowed for baseball is 11.7. For men's lax, it's 12.6.
I have been an advocate for dropping the sports that BC simply can't compete in because of weather. The roster is way too bloated. Sports like golf, tennis, track/field (and swim/dive which isn't seasonal but requires a great deal of money for infrastructure) all should go. Whether that money is allocated towards upgrading areas of fball/bball or to the start of something like men's lacrosse is an argument for another day, but it seems that lacrosse is a much more natural fit for BC than any of the above sports
Look at the quick success of BU, one of of the newer D1 lacrosse programs. A few years ago, BU was a weak club program. BU then made a serious commitment to building a competitive program. Today, BU is a top program and will be a national championship contender in the years to come. The roster consists of kids from the northeast, who are full pay students. From day 1, starting with Bill Flynn, a big baseball guy, BC lax never received the resources provided to baseball. The program, which was competitive in the early and mid-80s, was killed off from a lack of commitment by Flynn and his successors.
I agree - we now have our best baseball team in years and its still 5-11 in ACC play. We will never be able to compete consistently in ACC baseball. I'd like to blame it all on warm weather but we couldn't even get a single win against ND in the most recent series and lost to UConn. Need to focus on areas where we have the ability to recruit and compete provided we hire capable coaches: M&W Lacrosse, football, M&W basketball, M&W soccer, field hockey, M&W hockey. That's it. Deep six everything else and put the savings into recruiting and coaches. If we had serious leadership in the AD's office - this would have been done long ago.
While we're talking about club sports. Our club rugby team is a top 25 program in the nation. This was the final rankings last fall after BC won its bowl game against Alabama: http://www.goffrugbyreport.com/news/fall-men-di-college-rankings-week-11 This is with 0 NCAA teams, so it is actually a top 25 team in the country, all collegiate teams included.
They recently won the Atlantic Coast Rugby League Sevens Tournament. And will be at the CRC National Sevens Tournament airing on NBC June 4 & 5.
Currently the home pitch is on Brighton Campus right where the new baseball stadium is going in. I wonder where rugby will play/practice when that gets built.
LAX and cross county are the 2 fastest growing sports in the Midwest. BC should do some strategic planning and look at what will be the sports landscape in 10 years. It would appear LAX is gaining in popularity and has a tradition in the Northeast.
I agree that BC needs to take a hard look at several sports and consider dropping them. Villanova won a national title, largely due to the fact that most of their resources are going to basketball. Focusing resources is the best way for BC to achieve athletic success. On the other hand, an argument could be made that the point of college athletics is not to achieve success, but to provide participatory opportunities for students. I tend to favor the former.
Strategic Planning? That would be nice. Just announced, Harvard will host the Men's NCAA Div I Lacrosse championships at Gillette Stadium in 2017 and 2018. Whoops.
Lacrosse is eating Baseball's lunch in youth sports participation, especially in the Northeast, and NY/NE is still the overwhelming dominant region for lacrosse talent. One would think that a school might want to be competitive in sports which are local. I don't see any school in Minnesota propping up a diving team over hockey. Add in College Lacrosse's recent tv expansion, and the fact that it is fun to watch on tv, thanks to HD, and there is a huge opportunity here. I'm sure someone at UCONN will figure it out.
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