UC Berkeley

Breaking: baseball, rugby, three others to go at Cal

September 28, 2010 1:23 pm by Lance Knobel

Cal rugby, perennial champions

Following a joint faculty/alumni report urging cuts in the University of California Berkeley’s subsidies to its athletics programs, the university will announce today the elimination of five varsity sports: baseball, rugby, men’s and women’s gymnastics, and women’s lacrosse.

The cuts will save $4 million annually. The athletic department’s deficit has ranged from $10-13 million. Following the cuts, Cal will have 22 24men’s and women’s teams.

Cal’s rugby team is overwhelmingly the most successful sport at the university, and perhaps in the nation. It has won the national championship 25 times since 1980, including this year.

Chancellor Robert Birgeneau is holding a news conference about the cuts today at 2:30 p.m. Berkeleyside will provide an update from the news conference.

Update The university’s press release about the cuts is here.

17 Comments

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  • Georgia

    Why cut a winning team? How much would be saved per annum if football was cut?

  • Stefan

    Weak sauce!

  • Andrew

    But do rugby alumni give money??? Football may be expensive, but it brings in the dough. Still, it’s sad to see them cut a legacy of winning. But it’s a business today and pride is expensive.

  • Douglas L. Saunders

    My grandfather, Ward Bishop ‘Buck’ Saunders, Cal 1916, who played rugby for Cal 1911-1914 (and football 1915), and who became the first Cal player in the NFL in 1922 for the Toledo Maroons, would be ashamed of Cal for this decision.

  • John Seal

    A sad footnote: with the passing of Cal baseball, Cal’s summer youth baseball program will also go by the wayside. Actually, that’s not sad…it’s disgraceful.

  • http://twitter.com/Weezus Rachel A.

    Wow. Big disappointments. Personally, my 6 year olds will miss sitting in the bleachers and rooting for Cal baseball. It was special to be that close to the players and the game. One was planning to go to Cal and play baseball. I’m not up for breaking the news.

  • Douglas L. Saunders

    Rachel – force Sandy Barber and Robert Birgeneau to break the news to your kids.

  • http://twitter.com/Weezus Rachel A.

    What happens to the student/athletes? Scholarships?

  • James

    Cutting Rugby is a disgrace. The one team that wins on the field and in the classroom.

  • insidesource

    Very sad about the Gymnastics program. I guess that means no more Gymnastics at the Golden Bear Rec Center. My daughters will be sad. What kind of message does it send when a sport with a good representation of females is cut?

  • Douglas L. Saunders

    I assume an equal number of academic disciplines were cut? Slavic languages? Yiddish? other less popular disciplines? How about the administration fat, of which there are vast amounts?

  • Pingback: Bitting the bullet: behind the Cal sports decision | Berkeleyside

  • Al Jensen

    By no means should Rugby be cut. I’m sure it will survive in some voluntary form,
    but it is a fine sport and a long tradition at Cal.

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  • George Berkeley

    RUGBY ISN’T BEING “CUT” or “SLASHED” — this report is completely off. Really shoddy, in fact.

    Rugby is getting “reclassified,” almost certainly for purely Title IX reasons. Here’s the actual text from the chancellor’s letter:

    “In addition one team, rugby, will be transitioned to a newly created varsity club status. The team’s history indicates that this change should not affect its competitive opportunities or abilities, and the varsity club status will allow us to maintain rugby’s unsurpassed excellence with continued campus support in terms of admissions, sports medicine and access to training facilities. Rugby was a club sport at Cal from the 1950’s to the early 1990’s, and is today the only remaining varsity team in Division 1 of the NCAA.”

    So…admissions help, trainers and doctors, training facilities…and the same huge alumni $$ support. That’s not “cutting” — the other 4 sports will, by contrast, “no longer represent the university.”

  • Pingback: Cal sports cuts: the rugby puzzle | Berkeleyside

  • 2003Alumni DT

    The team is being demoted to “club status.” The varsity label didn’t really equate to much assistance from the school, since the students weren’t afforded any scholarships or other funding assistance. From what I gather, it really was a point of pride that the school “recognized” their hard work.

    Men’s rugby pays for virtually all of their own expenses. However from now on they will have to pay for everything, from access to doctors and use of the facilities. Their coach, Clark, attempted to address any Title IX issues by proposing that they also make women’s rugby a varsity sport, with funding for women’s scholarships and such, paid for by the men’s team. This was turned down without comment. I also just read that the school has now terminated Clark for the next fiscal year.

    The administration sure seems determined to live by their words that their still going to support the rugby team’s “excellence.” Such a shame that a team like that is being dismantled.