MAG NCAA Finals

[skschlag]

Are these being televised? I have been searching for any info, but cannot find it!

 

[Pigeon]

I couldn't find anything either. I thought it might be on the Big 10 network, but it doesn't look like it is. We are going to be there on Saturday night, and I was hoping to catch Friday on TV.

Looks like it might be possible to live stream it though?

http://www.ncaa.com/liveschedule/2017/04/21

Will have to cast it to the TV.

 

[GymDad23]

Pretty good article in reference to this....Link Removed

But until the men's competitions start packing the arenas, I don't think think live television coverage is going to ever take off. Shoot, wasn't the mens olympic events broadcasted on delay as well? It's very unfortunate. I would love to see the mens program being added to more colleges in the future, but that's probably just wishful thinking since it won't be able to compete with other sports in terms of interest. There's a ton of $ in most NCAA conferences, but the projected inflow from mens gymnastics make it easy for colleges to pass on. Hopefully I'm just being overly pessimistic, but this sport will dread the day that the only mens college gymnastics available will be club.

 

[Madden3]

There were 59 MAG Div one teams in 1981. There is a fraction of that now. College MAG was not some huge money sport in the 70's. It has nothing to do with interest, funding or packing arenas. It was Title IX and the way it has been interpreted and enforced that has caused colleges to reduce or eliminate male dominant sport programs and so, has greatly hurt MAG and many other sports and hurt male athletes. While sports like gymnastics and wrestling and track and field have seen the most dramatic reductions in college programs, even the number of college football programs has been reduced. Of course with college MAG being decimated this way leading to little opportunity for athletes to progress or coaches to train or fans to find the sport, the entire sport goes into a death spiral. Without reform of this law, I believe nothing will change.

My boys are going camping this weekend, I wish I could have dvrd the meet.

 

[profmom]

Don't blame Title IX. Blame football. Most college football programs lose money hand over fist once you do a completely honest accounting, and they provide so many exclusively male opportunities that it's very difficult for other men's teams to survive if a university is hell bent on keeping football. This has been well researched by sports economists.

 

[skschlag]

I agree that football is the problem. THere is no girls' sport that can bring in the sheer numbers that you need to have to do football. And football isn't going anywhere.

I know at some points, I have heard discussions about taking football out of the title ix numbers. I have read a lot about that occurring, and how it would actually bring back not only the smaller male sports, but women's sports too. Sure would be nice...

 

[Madden3]

Ok I never wanted to bring this up here because I was afraid this would happen. But I cannot sit still while people muse around the general theme of "why aren't there more MAG college programs" and everyone ignores the reason that MAG college programs and many other predominantly male collegiate sport programs have been eliminated.

Title IX is not about money 'made" but enforced gender equal participation (not opportunity) and equal spending in an area -sports- where there is not equal interest. Gymnastics and football co-existed fine prior to IX. It is only difficult for colleges to have both because of Title IX and the restrictions it places on male sports participation. If a college chooses one sport over another, that is their right and I assume they have their reasons, whether financial or not. My point is, Title IX made them have to choose!

If you think the results for women's sports and athletes from Title IX, which are dramatic, is worth what it has done to men's sports, you are free to have that opinion. But I do not see how you can get around the fact Title IX has decimated men's college sports programs.

 

[skschlag]

Hey...Adams State COllege just gave a football scholarship to a female kicker.....

 

[jenjean70]

Ok I never wanted to bring this up here because I was afraid this would happen. But I cannot sit still while people muse around the general theme of "why aren't there more MAG college programs" and everyone ignores the reason that MAG college programs and many other predominantly male collegiate sport programs have been eliminated.

Title IX is not about money 'made" but enforced gender equal participation (not opportunity) and equal spending in an area -sports- where there is not equal interest. Gymnastics and football co-existed fine prior to IX. It is only difficult for colleges to have both because of Title IX and the restrictions it places on male sports participation. If a college chooses one sport over another, that is their right and I assume they have their reasons, whether financial or not. My point is, Title IX made them have to choose!

If you think the results for women's sports and athletes from Title IX, which are dramatic, is worth what it has done to men's sports, you are free to have that opinion. But I do not see how you can get around the fact Title IX has decimated men's college sports programs.

I had NO idea about anything called Title IX and sports programs....that is very sad.

 

[sce]

I had NO idea about anything called Title IX and sports programs....that is very sad.

Truly sad. The reason for it was good, to provide more opportunities for women in sports. In the end it killed some fabulous men's sports.

 

[skschlag]

Well, in the end it was frustrating to watch. Had to choose an event, live scoring went down. but it was a great meet and the parts I saw were awesome! Congrats to all the teams!!

 

[profmom]

You cannot compare the funding environment for higher education in the 1970s to the funding environment now. They are totally different animals. If we had full state support for public higher education, then sure, we could probably have lots of men's and women's sports teams, including non-marquee sports like wrestling and gymnastics, in the cultural moment we inhabit, which exists in part because Title IX encouraged girls to play sports. But you have to confront the reality that colleges are making choices, and if they choose to support a team that has a roster of 120 men and no women (ok, we will say in the single digits across all teams nationally), then who is to blame?

Americans are very happy to cheer when our women's teams dominate in the Olympics, even though the individual teams and members themselves often get fewer resources, have fewer professional opportunities, and generally get less media coverage in spite of having real fan bases. You can thank Title IX for producing that dominance, and for creating a climate that attracts female athletes from all over the world to come to our institutions of higher education to have the chance to play.

There is a good deal of research on this. Equality didn't kill men's gymnastics. Colleges' choices about how to implement it did. Your beef is not with the women's gymnastics team at your local college. It's with your local college's decision to bump up to a D1 football program that will lose a ton of money and never make it into a bowl game but will enjoy a brand new training facility and a turf field so that it can attract junior college transfers who will struggle to pull 2.0 GPAs -- rather than continuing to support a men's gymnastics program that could attract national team members and could easily post the highest average GPA of an NCAA men's team on campus.

 

[profmom]

Anyway, back to the topic at hand -- I hope the videos are still up. The battle among Modi, Moldauer, and Bower for the individual AA was one for the ages, and having second place team come down to the last rotation was so exciting! We were near a group of OSU fans who nearly levitated through the roof of the arena when Melton landed his vault. It was a great meet, and I hope the powers that be were happy enough with the crowd at West Point that they consider bringing it back there again some time.

 

[Juniper311]

We were near a group of OSU fans who nearly levitated through the roof of the arena when Melton landed his vault.

Accurate.

 

[Pigeon]

The crowd at West Point was fantastic. I couldn't believe how loud it was! Do you think it helped to have the region 7 state team championships (and nationals prep camp) there at the same time? It was really a great gymnastics weekend!

 

[GymDad9.9]

The crowd at West Point was fantastic. I couldn't believe how loud it was! Do you think it helped to have the region 7 state team championships (and nationals prep camp) there at the same time? It was really a great gymnastics weekend!

I highly recommend Fourth of July concert and fireworks at West Point.

 

[profmom]

The crowd at West Point was fantastic. I couldn't believe how loud it was! Do you think it helped to have the region 7 state team championships (and nationals prep camp) there at the same time? It was really a great gymnastics weekend!

I think that was a brilliant pairing. They gave the state team kids free tickets. But beyond that, I saw a ton of coaches and L8-L10 kids from the region in the crowd, and not just the ones who made it to nationals. All of our L10 guys went.

My absolute favorite fan was the Navy mom who had the yellow foam ship. I want to be that mom when I grow up.