Football is out - but not down - at Colorado College

A lot of attention is being paid to the spring football practices at Colorado, Air Force and Colorado State – programs that have huge followings and bring in big dollars for their respective schools. Lost in the coverage of these practice sessions – which precede the season by more than four months – is the total loss of one of the state’s longest running and most traditional college football programs. After 127 years of playing college football, The Colorado College Tigers are off the schedule for good…or so it seems.

There is no perfect way to handle something as miserable as eliminating a storied college football program. When CC administrators made the decision on March 24th to end well more than a century of football at CC, it was done in a stark, matter of fact sort of manner that left supporters and alumni shocked and angry. They were stunned at the lack of warning given by the school, and by the fact that few – if any – of the prominent alums, such as NFL Films boss Steve Sabol, were asked to step up and help save the program. Now they’re pissed.

As is most often the case when a college athletics program is dropped, supporters and alums of Tiger football have banned together in an attempt to save the program. They are confident and emotional at the moment. Time will tell if they can be successful in the long run.

In a statement posted on the school’s web site, school administrators wrote, “With our current resources, we are unable to support the 20 varsity programs at an appropriate level. While these steps may seem drastic, they are necessary given our current financial standing. This is especially difficult considering the importance of football in the history of athletic competition at Colorado College. The decision was the culmination of hundreds of hours of research and evaluation by members of the athletic department, athletic board, students, senior staff and the Board of Trustees. It was not made in haste.”

Yet there is plenty of lingering bitterness among supporters of CC football (women’s softball and water polo were also cut.) They know that emotional efforts – they’ve already gathered more than $450,000 in pledges to bring back football – will only go so far. The money raised thus far is only about half of what would be needed for ONE football season. That’s a far cry from the type of support that would be needed for the school to even consider reinstatement. For that to happen, a long-term plan that would most likely need to include an endowment of some sort would have to be secured. That’s much easier said than done. A similar plan was close to bringing back baseball at the University of Colorado back in the late 1980’s, but ultimately failed.

But there is reason for optimism. Football is now back after a long absence at nearby Colorado State University – Pueblo. The Thunderwolves debuted last season after not fielding a team in almost 25 years – back when the school was still called the University of Southern Colorado. By most accounts, it was an enormous success, the stands were filled and the team was a very respectable 4-6 in their first season under head coach (and former CU assistant) John Wristen. Certainly the success of a reinstated program less than 30 minutes away could bode well for CC.

The model is in place, but for the Tigers to actually field a football team once again, expansion will likely have to part of the reinstatement. After playing at the Division III level all these years, CC is now competing in the far-flung Southern Collegiate Athletic Conference. That’s not going to work. The Tigers would need to find a way to move UP to Division II, and make the natural move to join the Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference – just as CSU-Pueblo did. That would create a much more manageable travel situation, as well as creating rivalries that could renew interest and present some lucrative marketing opportunities, which are critical given the current economic environment.

If the commitment is strong enough, and a plan is created that can overcome a whole lot of obstacles, then it’s possible that Colorado College could follow the lead of CSU-Pueblo and give the southern part of the state its own version of the Rocky Mountain Showdown.