Cougars volleyball slashed

In response to Title IX considerations and the restructuring of the athletic department with the departure of volleyball coaches Wayne and Susan Kreklow, Columbia College is discontinuing its men’s varsity volleyball program and turning it into a club pro gram next season.

The decision, made on Wednesday night, came on the heels of the Cougars defeat of then-No. 1 California Baptist in Los Angeles.

The Cougars are 22-2 and went undefeated (19-0) in Midwest Intercollegiate Volleyball Association play for the third season in a row.

The news was stunning but not completely unexpected. After hiring a replacement coaches for its two-time NAIA champion women’s volleyball program and men’s soccer team, the Columbia College athletic department completed its two top priorities.

The Cougar men sensed the end was near when there were no job postings for their team after co-coaches Wayne and Susan Kreklow left to take over the MU women’s program.

“I was dreading this, hoping it wouldn’t happen,” said senior setter Mike Taylor, the team’s assist leader. “With Wayne and Susan (Kreklow) leaving, it was a perfect time for (athletic director) Bob (Burchard) to kill this program.”

The athletic department is currently undergoing a “restructure period,” according to Burchard.

“We’re in a process of deciding what sports to keep, seeing what fits into our organization and our sponsors,” Burchard said.

Currently all Cougar teams play in the American Midwest Conference, with the exception of the men’s volleyball team, which plays in the MIVA. Nationwide the NAIA has around 300 women’s volleyball programs compared to 28 men’s programs. The men’s volleybal l national tournament is not a NAIA-sanctioned; it is an invitational.

These factors and Columbia College not being in compliance with Title IX, a 1972 law that requires equity among the sexes within education, were factors in Burchard’s decision.

“We are in no way trying to take away opportunities from our kids,” Burchard said. “We’re just trying to configure our department.”

The athletic department is considering adding another women’s sports program, most likely basketball, which would then the women’s to men’s team ratio 3 to 2.

Currently the school’s student population is 55.5 percent female and 44.5 percent male and there are 27 females with athletic scholarships, compared to 46 men according to Columbia College’s Equity in Athletics Disclosure report. Also, the athletic depart ment currently spends $2,000 more on recruiting men than women ($4,300-$2,500, respectively), with 91 percent of its athletics revenue coming from men’s programs.

Players currently on the volleyball team will be allowed to keep their scholarships and play at the club level next year, a drastic step down for the nation’s top NAIA team. Six years ago the Cougars started a club team and played at that level until 1996 when the team began playing at the varsity level.

“Six years of hard work gone to waste,” said Taylor, who was one of the original members of the Cougars’ varsity squad.

One of the players most likely to leave the Cougars is Winder Montano, a five-year veteran of the Venezuela men’s national team who came to Columbia College to play volleyball and learn English while at the school.

“No one is going to play in club level. This is truly a lack of respect,” Montano said in Spanish. “I would understand if we were a bad team that was worst in the conference, but we’re No. 1 in the nation. This really doesn’t make sense to me.”

Montano, who is considering transferring to Lindenwood University, is one of the many high-profile international recruits the Cougars have been able to obtain for its men’s volleyball team.

This year’s squad featured Montano, Bulgarian Ivan Topchivsky and Chinese players Jin Song Zhao and Chen Feng. The team also had top-level American players in Taylor and K.C. Trimble.

“There’s no way we can recruit these type of players with us now being a club team,” Taylor said.

The team was defenseless with the departure of the Kreklows. When Wayne joined Susan to co-coach the Cougar women’s volleyball team in 1994, a men’s club team was formed at Wayne’s insistence.

“Burchard took advantage of the situation,” Taylor said. “If Wayne and Susan were here, this would have never happened.”

The decision was made after Burchard met with Columbia College president Dr. Gerald Brouder and other members of a special committee to decide the future structure of the school’s athletic department. No men’s volleyball players or coaches were part of th is committee.

Taylor and Montano said that Burchard made it to very few of their volleyball matches and only briefly mentioned their accomplishments at the athletic awards dinners.

“It was these little things like this that gave us (the team) the feeling something bad was going to happen,” Taylor said.

“Bob didn’t like volleyball here and a lot of people knew that,” Montano said.

“I don’t understand why they (athletic department) don’t want this team,” said Cougar interim head coach Xu Bing, who has taken an assistant coaching position at West Palm Beach College and also played for Columbia from 1997-1999. “The players deserve a c hance to display their skills on the national level.”

The Cougars will get a few more chances to do so: at the MIVA champioships this weekend and the 2000 NAIA national tournament April 14 and 15.

“It will be sweet revenge to win our first championship,” Taylor said. “We want to win it for our fans, the community that supported us here in Columbia, not necessarily for the athletic department that betrayed us.”

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