March 6, 2008
Syracuse Women Joining CHA; No Men's Hockey Soon
by Adam Wodon/Managing Editor
College Hockey America's men's league may be facing a crisis of survival, but the women's league is surging forward.
The CHA announced today that Syracuse University will join its women's league for next season, giving it five teams. Meanwhile, despite past excitement over the possibility of Syracuse having a D-I men's team, that is not imminent.
"When and if men's hockey comes on board remains to be seen," said Henry Wildhack, associate AD at Syracuse. "There's been no timetable yay or nay. It's something we'd like to do, if we can. ... We'd love to play, but we've got to do it a certain way. We're comfortable with that."
In announcing the women's move, Syracuse AD Daryl Gross expressed excitement.
"We are excited to start our journey to becoming extraordinary in women's ice hockey," Gross said. "We are grateful to College Hockey America for recognizing the commitment we've made to be competitive in the sport. We believe we will enhance the conference and will do our best to represent it in the most amazing fashion."
But Title IX restrictions, among other issues, prevent Syracuse from immediately starting a men's program. Wildhack said it's all just wait and see at this point.
"It's one of the issues (Title IX)," Wildhack said. "I'm not going to prioritize them in that fashion at all.
"I would say I'm hopeful. Yes it's possible, of course it's possible. But we're going to wait and see how women's hockey goes, we're going to wait and see how it goes with Title IX. Those are the things we're looking at and we'll go from there.
"It logically makes the most sense to us to see how the women's program is accepted and analyze everything from there."
Lets see how women's hockey does before we add a men's team, seems backwards to me. I'd like to see Syracuse have a mens' and women's team to be honist but to gage weather you are going to have a men's team on the success of women's team doesn't seem right to me..
Mar 8 2008, 8:52 pm by Dusty, Madison, WI
I don't get why Title IX doesn't work interchangeably... if there's a women's hockey team, there should be a men's team too. Period. Now that may sound sexist, but I'm a Brown University sports fan in general, and Brown currently has probably 5 more women's teams than men's. I'm not complaining or anything; frankly I don't care if the women have a few more sports than the men. And i don't see why it can't be the same going the opposite way.
I don't know. Maybe I'm biased. But I really think that if 'Cuse wants a women's team, they should get a men's team too, or neither.
Mar 9 2008, 10:29 pm by Jim, Rhode island
They do work interchangeably. They need to be even. If Syracuse adds women's hockey, it means it's already adjusting for an imbalance. Adding men's hockey would make it unbalanced again.
Mar 10 2008, 12:20 am by CHN Editor
Just to elaborate, and to preface by saying I am not an expert -- Title IX is a federal ruling from the 1970s assuring equal opportunities in education and the courts have decided this extends to athletics. Basically, the opportunities (which often means scholarships, number of athletes supported by all teams, etc.) have to be in line with the student population. So if the population is 55% female and 45% male, the athletic opportunities must mirror that. Where schools like Syracuse can get in trouble, is that football accounts for so many more scholarships, etc. than any other sport. That can lead to cutting other men's sports, or adding women's sports, as they have done with hockey, to bring the ratios more in line. Brown, according to one source I found, has a population that is 54% female, so it needs to provide opportunities in athletics that are in line with that ratio -- remembering that they have football which has more players than several women's teams may have.
Mar 10 2008, 12:37 am by Mike Machnik, CHN
Adding men's hockey would be creating an imbalance in of a sexist law. It would be similar to allowing women to play sports at all in the 60's. The editor is making the incorrect assertion that men and women participate at sports with the same frequency.
Title IX implementation is a violation of the spirit and the letter of the law and is not interchangeable
Title IX says no individual shall be discriminated against on the basis of gender. If so, the men and women should face the same requirements to get a team started. Instead, they are judged on the basis of their gender and as a class. Notice. this is the only place it takes place. If The quota system is the hallmark of equality, why isn't applied first to the student population? Match the general population - 51%female, 49% male. Start denying girls education when boys don't show up. Just like in athletics.
Let's see how many complain when Title IX truly becomes interchangeable.
Mar 27 2008, 11:02 pm by Aaron, St. Louis
As an SU alum, it's nice to see. I wish we had hockey - men's or women's when I was there.
The only problem is that there's not really an arena on campus. The ice rink was built my last year, and I think there was more seating at the rink where I played pee-wee hockey. There is an AHL venue in the city, but it's kind of hard to get SU students to go anywhere off-campus. I'd hate to see the prospect of SU hockey drying up due to lack of interest, then missing out on a men's team. Translation: use some of McNabb's money to build a new fieldhouse with seating for women's hoops and hockey.
Apr 21 2008, 8:22 am by David, Wilmington
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