ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Sunday, June 9, 1996 TAG: 9606100077
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: DOUG DOUGHTY STAFF WRITER
GENDER EQUITY CONCERNS - and hard work - have paid off with varsity status for the Virginia women's crew program, and now the team is talking NCAA title.
The 6 a.m. workouts were tolerable. So were the weightlifting sessions and the weekends away from campus in the spring.
In fact, there is little about their college experience that the seniors in the Virginia women's crew program don't cherish.
Well, maybe they didn't always look forward to approaching strangers in the parking lots at Virginia football games and soliciting contributions.
``We used to take a lot of our own time selling raffle tickets and selling T-shirts,'' said Julie Dumas, a senior from Long Beach, N.Y. ``For me, I definitely dreaded it. I wasn't good at asking people for money.''
Team members also had to pay dues of $100 per semester, all of which changed with the announcement Nov.11, 1994, that women's crew would become UVa's 24th varsity intercollegiate sport.
Women's crew had been around UVa as a club sport since 1974 - and enjoyed some degree of success - but, with varsity status, the program jumped to a new level. Coach Kevin Sauer thinks an NCAA championship could be in the Cavaliers' future.
There is basis for such optimism in the 44-0 record the Cavaliers carried into the Intercollegiate Rowing Association Championships last week in Camden, N.J., where they finished fourth.
``It was heartbreaking in that we wanted to medal and we wanted to win,'' said coxswain Heather Hickson, a senior from Mount Laurel, N.J., ``but you can look at it two ways. We did a good job for never having been there before.''
The competition was stiffer this weekend in Cincinnati, where Virginia rowed in the Collegiate National Championships. The Cavaliers' lightweight four finished fourth, and the varsity eight was sixth. Next year, there will be an NCAA championship for the first time.
``It's an emerging sport for women,'' said Sauer, 42, who rowed collegiately at Purdue. ``It's one of the sports the NCAA identified as a way to help make this [gender] equity thing work out because there are so many numbers.''
There are 59 women in the UVa women's program and the limit for women's crew scholarships, 20, is higher than any NCAA-sanctioned sport but football. Kansas, for instance, is giving out five scholarships this year and plans to increase that by five a year until 1999.
Sauer doesn't expect UVa to move at that pace, but he expects an increase in the 3-31/2 grants he has been allotted for this year.
``We didn't do much recruiting at all until this year,'' Sauer said. ``This year, we have about 20 kids coming who rowed in high school. Not all will be on grant-in-aid, but the word is out there that UVa is the place to be if you want to be a good college rower. Things are happening here.''
Hickson, who had no previous association with rowing, learned about Virginia's program from a flyer on extracurricular activities at the school. Dumas had rowed in high school, but did not consider women's crew in her decision to come to UVa.
``I thought it was something I might do in college,'' she said, ``but boy, I never realized it would become such a major part of my life. It's definitely an all-or-nothing activity.''
Sauer said he expects several of his recruits to contend for starting spots, but not all of the scholarship money has gone to newcomers.
``It's nothing we talk about,'' Hickson said, ``but yes, I do get some money. It's not a huge scholarship; in fact, it's a very small one, but it's nice to know we're appreciated. They're not just looking for experienced rowers and saving the scholarships for them.''
Sauer is highly regarded in the rowing community, and last fall he was approached by a program more established than Virginia's. Five years ago, he might have taken the offer. Not now.
``The university has showed a lot of support,'' Sauer said, ``and the kids have been very enthusiastic and worked very hard to make this go. Why leave now? I've gotten a second wind. A second, second wind.''
Sauer, after serving as an adviser to U.S. Rowing, took over as director of rowing at UVa in 1988. He liked the school and the facilities at the Rivanna Reservoir and had a five-year timetable for achieving varsity status for men and women - a deadline that came and went.
``I was thinking, `This is about it,''' Sauer said. ``Then, about four years ago, a guy moved to town named Tom Allan, who had rowed at Penn. He helped us out with a truck to pull our trailer and gave us a chunk of money to build a new boathouse.
``All that kind of breathed new life into me and the program.''
Sauer realizes the same factors that contributed to Virginia recognizing women's crew - federal guidelines for equity in participation and scholarships - will make it difficult for men's crew to become a varsity sport.
``That's not going to happen,'' Sauer said. ``The reason the women went varsity is because of Title IX. If they take on the men that's going to make us inequitable again, but I'm trying to get the men to coattail on it as much as possible.''
UVa is in the process of hiring a new men's crew coach, with Sauer more than willing to serve as a resource. Certainly, he has plenty of experience in fund raising, as do his rowers.
``We're lucky that we got to experience both sides,'' Hickson said. ``The club team was very special in that we had to work really hard to get the funding to do what we wanted to do. So, you only did crew if you absolutely loved it.
``I never would have described our situation as `bleak,' but everything's a lot easier now with the varsity status. I kind of wish I could stay around, but until we had it, we never knew any better. So, I don't think it diminished our experience at all.''
LENGTH: Long : 109 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: DANIEL GROGAN. 1. UVa women's crew, which had beenby CNBaround since 1974 as a club program, has come a long way with
varsity status. color. 2. UVa coach Kevin Sauer says, ``the kids
have been very enthusiastic and worked very hard to make this go.''
3. The Cavaliers took a 44-0 record into the Intercollegiate Rowing
Association Championships, where they finished fourth.