from avca.org:

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LEXINGTON, Ky. (April 21, 2009) - The NCAA Division I Legislative Council added sand volleyball to the list of emerging sports for women, it was announced today, clearing the way for schools to use the sport toward minimum sponsorship requirements and minimum financial aid awards. NCAA Division II had already voted to add sand volleyball to the emerging sports list at the 2009 NCAA Convention in January.

“The opportunity to play sand volleyball in the spring will spur growth in the sport. I wish I had that opportunity when I was at Stanford!” said 2008 Olympic Beach Gold Medalist, Kerri Walsh. “Additionally, this development will give more women an opportunity for a professional volleyball career in the United States."

Capitalizing on the recent success of USA Volleyball’s beach teams in the Olympics and the growth in grassroots programs, the NCAA’s Committee on Women’s Athletics made the recommendation to add the sport to the emerging sports list last summer.

"The United States has a proud and successful history in sand volleyball, having won at least one gold medal in every Summer Games since the discipline was added to the Olympic program in 1996,” said USAV CEO Doug Beal. “This move by the NCAA is wonderful, particularly in light of the increased varsity athletic opportunities for young women at the collegiate level and the synergy with already existing USA Volleyball programs.”

The NCAA will call the new sport “sand” volleyball, rather than “beach” volleyball, in hopes that the sport will have broad appeal across the country and not be confined to coastal areas. Already schools including The University of Texas, the University of Nebraska, and the University of Utah are competing in collegiate competitions in the spring.

“The addition of sand volleyball to the list of collegiate options is significant for our sport,” said Kathy DeBoer, Executive Director of the American Volleyball Coaches Association. “With more than 400,000 girls playing high school volleyball, we welcome the addition of collegiate roster spots.”

The group most responsible for spreading the popularity of the sport beyond the California coast is the Association of Volleyball Professionals (AVP) which hosts a series of competitions on man-made courts at in-land locations like Cincinnati, Ohio, Atlanta, Ga., and Las Vegas, Nev. The AVP also sponsors a series of indoor sand competitions in January and February called “Hot Winter Nights” in cold-weather cities like Omaha, Ne. and Grand Rapids, Mich.

“We are thrilled that the NCAA has voted to make sand volleyball a collegiate sport,” said Jason Hodell, CEO of AVP Pro Beach Volleyball. “The vote confirms the momentum behind the sport of beach volleyball, and we are excited to help grow our sport on the college level and create new beach volleyball stars around the country.”

The NCAA will spend the next year developing the rules that will govern sand volleyball as a collegiate sport, including regulations on financial aid, playing dates and recruiting. Institutions will be able to sponsor varsity programs starting in the 2010-2011 academic year.

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Anybody think we'll try to pick this up?

It just takes $$$.

And consideration of Title IX.

It sure beats Bowling...

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And consideration of Title IX.

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Not really. The shame of Title IX is that it has gone beyond its original intended purpose (to create equal opportunities for women) and has actually created discrimination against men...leading to mens teams being cut and womens teams being created purely for the sake of satisfying Title IX even when the interest in said sport is minimal (women's crew and equestrian are the usual suspects...and while I know that some people are very interested in the two, most girls growing up in Texas do neither yet we have several D1 womens teams in each yet we have only one D1 mens soccer team...but I digress).

Anyway, the bottom line is that Title IX only protects women from being underrepresented, so we can have as many womens teams as we want. I also imagine that a lot of the girls that will be playing sand volleyball will also be playing traditional volleyball and the facility won't be super-expensive, so the cost ought to be relatively inexpensive.

I do love beach volleyball. This is something I would pay to go watch.

[This message has been edited by Harry Dunne (edited 4/22/2009 8:26p).]

I expect that beach volleyball will pick up enough steam nation wide to quickly move from "emerging sport" status to full sport status, especially if the Americans continue to dominate the Olympics.

If I had read the original post in its entirety I would have realized this was about WOMEN'S sand volleyball. I assumed it was both men and women.

A&M will not add another men's sport unless they add more women's sports.

I agree Title IX makes it easy to add women's sports, assuming there is funding. Funding isn't just facilities and coaches - it is scholarships.

If only they would cut football scholarships down....

A&M has as many NCAA football scholarships as any other school. The difference at A&M is that we have former students who give a LOT of money to the athletic department and they have the right to say where the money goes. That means football has a lot of "extra" scholarship money. If the money has been designated, A&M can't reallocate it.

[This message has been edited by WAaggie07 (edited 4/23/2009 10:11a).]

Waggie07 - I understand it completely.

I want to see the NCAA reduce football scholarships across the board.

Football screws up all other men's sports.

Because Title IX essentially requires equal opportunities ("scholarships" for men and women - most Div 1 schools cannot fund as many men's sports when 85 FULL scholarships are dedicated to football.

I don't believe the sport of college football would materially suffer with fewer scholarships. Make football allocate schlolarships in fractional amounts like every sport except basketball. Big money donors would have no reason to reduce their donations.

BTW - I support TitleIX. I support the core principles it stands for. I also don't care one bit that football makes the most money.

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BTW - I support TitleIX. I support the core principles it stands for. I also don't care one bit that football makes the most money.

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I support Title IX as well. Since its inception, female participation in high school sports has increased something like 900% - incredible...and I know what you mean about supporting its principles so I don't want to take what you have written out of context, but:

To say that you don't care that football makes all of the money...I don't know about that. I think the important thing to remember is that without football (and basketball), there would be no volleyball, softball, even women's basketball! By the same token there would also be no mens tennis, swimming, etc. either. The bottom line is that without the revenue generated by revenue-generating sports, there would not be non-revenue sports - at least not as we know them. They would have to exist more like club teams. Where would sports like womens tennis and volleyball come up with the $500,000 operating budgets that they have?

There's a reason why a school's football success impacts other sports so greatly. Look at tennis, swimming, track, softball...almost every school that is good at these sports has a strong football or basketball program. There are a few "niche" schools like Rice or Cal St. Fullerton that focus on baseball or Santa Clara and Portland that focus on soccer but for the most part great football leads to great overall athletics.

The thing is, you can't MAKE people want to watch women's equestrian...or men's swimming, or a lot of other sports. The general public loves football and is willing to spend money on football and if the football stinks then the cease to spend the money (unless they are brainwashed Aggies ) and then there's not nearly as much money for the other sports.

So to say that you are an avid supporter of women's sports and that you don't care how much money football makes, I assume that you mean that you don't think that football spending should be proportionate to football revenue and that's true - and its not.

Football accounts for 60% of athletic department revenue. If you don't count non-sport-specific $ contributions to the athletic department and consider only individual sports, then football accounts for almost 75% of all revenue...and that includes men's basketball who makes another 13%.

On the flip side, football only accounts for 23% of athletic department expenses.

Football made $25 million dollar last year. Men's basketball made nearly $2 million. Women's basketball LOST nearly $2 million. The athletic department as a whole made $5 million...meaning that all of the other sports lost about $20 million dollars.

Harry Dunne - I should have been more clear. I understand how important football revenue is to the athletic department. But what I'm not sympathetic to is the use of the "it makes the most money" argument as a reason to not care about the other sports.

I don't believe football revenue would fall if scholarships were cut by 30 (or more). The kids still will want to play football in college. But they might have to split scholarships - just like baseball, track, swimming, etc. If 30 extra scholarships were available for men's sports A&M (and other schools) might be able to add wrestling, volleball, etc. They can't do so because their hands are tied by Title IX.

If football scholarships were cut - the coaches would be more careful awarding scholarships. They might be less likely to go after marginal students that tie up a scholarship but don't perform on the field. The quality of the game shouldn't suffer either. The elite athletes would always find a place to play.

BTW - I would cut the scholarships for football 5 per year until they reached 46 - 2 deep on offense and defense plus 2 kickers. Schools could give out fractional scholarships as they might see fit.

A possible side effect would favor in-state schools since kids staying in state on a partial scholarship would pay in-state tuition.

[This message has been edited by SpicewoodAg (edited 4/23/2009 7:06p).]

I agree...and actually the last time they cut football scholarship numbers down (I believe they used to have 85 per team...maybe more?), it actually helped the overall competitiveness of college football because the top teams couldn't hoard blue chippers three-deep at every position.

It is still 85 per team...I would like to see at the NFL roster size ~53 or so...If the pros can do it, so can the colleges...

[This message has been edited by Look Out Below (edited 4/23/2009 4:46p).]

You're right, I'm sorry - it used to be 105, then was cut to 95 in the 70s, and to 85 in the 90s.

I don't think this would cause much of an impact from a scholarship perspective. I would guess most of the girls from the indoor team would just play outdoors. Making it more of a fall & Spring sport.

This would be along the same lines as Cross Country, Indoor track, and Outdoor track. 3 sports, same athletes, same scholarships. Thoughts?

But since sand volleyball is played with only two players on a team how easily does it translate going from indoor with 6? I wonder if the same players would be as effective playing outdoor style.
Also, would the match consist of the one team playing their two best players against the other teams 2 best players or would it be kind of like Tennis where you have 3 or so different pairs playing per team and whoever has the most pair wins gets the match point?

From what I've heard it is going to be the same players with the same coaches. Most beach vball pros played college indoor and most college teams train outdoors in sand when the weather is nice because it helps a lot with the indoor game (the strength and movement you build and the different angles, etc.)...so basically it is going to be similar to track with the indoor and outdoor seasons.

I can see using the same players for the most part, and that it will be a very popular sport. However, I just can't see the NCAA or the schools passing on the chance to add additional women's scholarships somehow.

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It is still 85 per team...I would like to see at the NFL roster size ~53 or so...If the pros can do it, so can the colleges..

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NFL also has practice squads and can sign free agents if somebody gets hurt. College football can't do that.

Most AD lose money, so if they cut football scholarships, they'll reduce the number of womans scholarships by the same amount.

Just because they give 85 scholarships doesn't mean that is A&M's limit on players...I'd bet there are 110-120 players on our team...The NFL can't do that (and their practice squads are not large at all anyway -- MUCH less than 85 when you combine the two).

The Title IX rules are based on participation as well as scholarships. You cut scholarships and you still have 100+ kids playing football.

I say add it quick!

Who wants to be in charge of picking out the team bikinis?

Name another team sport besides football in which the full roster is 7-10 times larger than the number of players who can actually participate at any given time.

College FB is a great sport and I'm glued to my TV like everyone else, but ADs and coaches have become very very spoiled in their expectations of the amount of money and attention it deserves.

Common sense legislation: we should exempt any money-making sport from counting towards the sexual equality- if football is the only damn sport making money, it shouldn't be that we now have to have 85 women on scholarship elsewhere and zero men.

if the sport makes money (95% of them don;t) then they should leave it alone and let the other sports have equal participation.

If it's going to be largely the same players, I'm not sure how this will help Title 9 compliance. You can't give a player more than a full scholarship.

And if it doesn't help with Title 9 compliance, I'm not sure the sport will take off that fast among NCAA schools.

Since it is largely the same players, then basically you are just giving more scholarships to volleyball in general with beach players "walking on" to the court team and vice-versa.

True...which means most schools will be adding sand vball because it will be a huge disadvantage not to (less scholarships to go around).

It will take off really fast for 2 reasons - the one above, and the fact that tons of hormone-filled college guys are going to come to every match. Especially at A&M, attendance will be great.

Interesting. In that case, I could see the sport growing fast because it would give schools with a beach volleyball team a competitive advantage for regular volleyball (more total scholarships).

edit: dunne stole my thunder.

[This message has been edited by Aston04 (edited 5/6/2009 10:59a).]

HD, don't remind me about the hormone filled college boys. My daughter is playing in the Texas Open on Stewart Beach in Galveston this weekend- she'll be the one wearing an ankle-length skirt with sweat pants underneath and a turtle-neck. You'll know me- I am the one with a shotgun. Seriously, the shorts she wears for court VB bothers me more than the ones she wears for beach.