CIS CORNER: NOISE ON THE WESTERN FRONT

Big doings in the "arms race" that's taking place across the CIS: Western has announced a significant cash investment in its varsity sports program.

The boost includes $700,000 for scholarships for student-athletes (which include an academic component), about half of which is coming from alumni giving. Reading between the lines, this has a lot to do with football, namely the nagging fact that the Mustangs, a one-time lodestar of Canadian university football, have yet to win a conference championship this decade (or, cough, beat the Queen's Golden Gaels on a consistent basis).

This touches on the argument for creating a super-conference in Eastern Canada for university football. Let's face it, many alumni and students do take university sports seriously and want to watch our own compete on a bigger stage instead of peeping in on the oversized (and overrated) NCAA spectacle south of the border. At the same time, not every CIS member school has Western's alumni base or a student body of 35,000, so you can see what this means for the already dodgy competitive balance in football.

A lot of schools want to NCAA-ify their programs (if not actually join the NCAA). There are enough ripples in the water -- seeing teams announce incoming freshmen in April and May, this school or that school announcing the construction of a Cadillac sports complex -- to suggest there has been a sea change over the past five years. If more money is kicking around the CIS (still a fraction of the mazuma kicking around in the NCAA), it threatens the legitimacy of competition and the number of athletic opportunities available for all students. If schools such as Western, which has 35,000 students, have all this money sunk into sports -- not that there's anything wrong with that -- everyone else either has to follow suit or risk falling to the level of the U of T football team.

That's part of why the buzzword right now with sports-admin types in Canada is "optimization" -- pouring resources into a handful of sports where a school traditionally excels. It's paid off for Carleton with five CIS men's basketball titles in a row, but a few weeks ago the school cut eight sports (and subsequently reinstated all but one after a huge outcry).

How does it help the greater good if fewer students are competing in varsity sports?

Canada could stand to adopt many elements of the NCAA -- the level of public interest, the media coverage, better pay for coaches. It has to be done carefully, and with the greater good in mind.

It should not lead to schools feeling they can't compete in certain sports and giving up, or sending out dedicated student-athletes with their legs essentially tied just so the school can say it has a team. Hearing that Western increasing its spending on sports is positive for the CIS, but it should be taken with some reservation. What's good for any one school is not good for everyone.

(Of course, Western would think it was doing pretty well if it could beat Queen's in football at least half the time. Just kidding, but not really.)

That's all for now. Send your thoughts to neatesager@yahoo.ca.