With major college athletics departments "under increasing financial pressure that seems likely to threaten many Olympic sport programs," USOC CEO Scott Blackmun yesterday "outlined several ways his organization may become involved with helping support those sports within the NCAA structure," according to Steve Berkowitz of USA TODAY. In remarks at the National Press Club, Blackmun "talked about the prospect of U.S. national sport governing bodies working with the NCAA to sponsor national championships in various sports and about the USOC finding ways to support endowments of Olympic sports teams, coaching positions and scholarships." He said that the USOC will meet with a group of athletic directors "under the auspices of the National Association of College Directors of Athletics to form a working group to explore other ideas." Blackmun added that the USOC has "identified a donor willing to provide" $5M to back this effort "if the right ideas can be found." Blackmun said that he "did not foresee the USOC directly providing endowment money to college athletic programs," but that he "is a believer in this type of fundraising." He said the USOC would like to see "if we can throw our support behind that concept and get people who believe in their universities as well as people who believe in the Olympics to support the endowment." He added colleges and the USOC must "build partnerships that benefit them in addition to us" (USA TODAY, 10/22). Blackmun said that since '81, "college men's gymnastics teams dropped from 59 to 16, women's gymnastics teams from 99 to 62, and wrestling teams from 146 to 77." Blackmun: "As somebody who knows about this recently said to me, no college athletic director has ever been fired for terminating an Olympic sport program. Our concern stated very bluntly is that the inevitable reallocation of resources in college athletics will make it even more difficult for Olympic sport programs to survive" (CBSSPORTS.com, 10/21).
