Blindsided: UW swimmers react to loss of program

May 1, 2009, 12:00 AM

Senior Liz Johnson found out via email. Sophomore Russ Mahan was told with a group of others by UW athletic director Scott Woodward. Men's and women's swimming are no longer varsity sports at the University of Washington, and the people most impacted by it still can't believe it. "I was just really surprised, and definitely blindsided because we'd had a really great season this year," said Johnson, who will graduate in the spring. "Everything [head coach] Whitney [Hite] brought to UW has not only impacted just the swim team, but all the other sports too. So I just couldn't believe they would choose the swim team to cut." The cuts, announced by Woodward earlier today, are expected to account for about $1.2 million of the $2.8 million the athletic department hopes to shave from its budget. "Discontinuing a sport is one of the most difficult decisions we face in college athletics," Woodward said in a statement. Multiple UW swimmers interviewed said that their facilities likely made them an easier target to be discontinued than any other varsity sport. "I guess it's the easiest to just be like, 'We can't afford to build them a new pool,'" Johnson said. "Soccer doesn't have any better facilities than we do, or baseball." But that didn't make the news any easier to take. "The initial reaction for the team was an enormous disappointment for everyone, just because of the amount of work we'd put in and the amount of progress we'd made," Mahan said. "For it just to disappear within a three minute meeting, the whole thing is gone...it was just a big, disappointing ordeal." Of the 34 swimmers on scholarship (19 men, 15 women), 23 have eligibility remaining. All existing scholarships will be honored, and the UW will allow other swim programs to contact anyone wishing to transfer. That's a route Mahan, whose decision to come to UW was based "80 percent off of swimming," is considering. "I am," he said. "I'm not exactly sure if I'm going to do that or not. Not sure where. It just happened this morning, so I'm kind of taking in what happens." While the UW athletic department is self-reliant, the university is facing serious cuts across the board, which will translate to higher tuition rates for students. That, coupled with a decreased return on the university's endowment investments, led to Woodward's decision, he said. "Since we are a self-sustaining operation with no funding assistance from the University or the state, [we] must find ways to reduce expenses and increase revenues in these difficult times," Woodward said. Five men's swimming teams and eight women's teams remain in the Pac-10. Other Pac-10 schools could soon feel the ramifications of the cuts too, since the conference requires a minimum of six teams to take part in a sport in order for it to be sanctioned. "We don't know what this means yet," said Tammy Newman, a Pac-10 Men's Swimming & Diving Championships administrator. Newman says the committee that deals with swimming will meet next week to discuss, among other things, what to do in light of the shortage. Friday's announcement marks the second time this decade that the UW has discontinued its swimming program, the first coming in 2000 under former AD Barbara Hedges. She would later reverse her decision after public outcry. The reaction may be the same this year. But for swim team members like Johnson and Mahan, the shock of no longer having a team still hasn't quite sunk in yet. "I had zero idea," Johnson said. "Even looking back now, I couldn't even see this coming." Reach reporters Christian Caple and Maks Goldenshteyn at sports@dailyuw.com.

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