Lost in recent discussions of autonomy and student-athlete compensation, one of Auburn’s most successful athletic sports faces an uncertain future with the NCAA.
The NCAA Committee on Women’s Athletics recommended to remove equestrian from a list of emerging sports in October 2014 after the sport failed to meet the minimum of 40 schools in 10 years.
According to Leah Fiorentino, executive director of the National Collegiate Equestrian Association (NCEA), 24 schools currently sponsor equestrian at the NCAA level.
While that number falls short of the NCAA requirements, recent organizational changes have many convinced the sport’s future may be brighter than it seems.
“We have all these plans laid out and ready to go, but we’re just waiting in limbo for the NCAA to make a decision one way or the other,” Fiorentino said. “We are cautiously very optimistic about the direction equestrian is going to move in.”
In a December 2014 summit of collegiate equestrian coaches, Auburn equestrian coach Greg Williams said initiatives were undertaken to better organize the sport’s power structure.
Williams said the most impactful change has been the addition of Fiorentino in an executive director role and the establishment of a national advisory board to support the financial stability of the sport.
According to Williams, the sport’s reorganization has allowed for greater networking between sponsors and invested parties, while also debunking myths about the sport.
“I think a misunderstanding plays a big role in this,” Williams said. “Across the board, equestrian is one of the most inexpensive [sports] per head. People just automatically think it’s expensive.”
The Auburn athletic department’s 2014 budget report backs up this statement.
According to tables gathered by the Opelika-Auburn News, equestrian posted the fewest losses of any women’s sport on campus, with $139,528 in losses.
Fiorentino said the work of Williams and Auburn is the model for equestrian programs nationwide.
“We’re trying to help other campuses get to a point like where Greg Williams has Auburn,” Fiorentino said. “They’re really a model to kind of follow suit and become more independent as a financial contributor to the athletic profile.”
For now, however, it’s a game of wait-and-see for NCAA equestrian, which is low on the NCAA’s priority list according to Fiorentino.
“If you want to call it a perfect storm, we have the definition of a perfect storm,” Fiorentino said. “The NCAA is focusing on all types of stuff like the O’Bannion case and cost of attendance, so they don’t want to focus on something that is small on their radar. There are teams that are considering, but they don’t want to do it until the recommendation clears one way or the other.”
Williams said he expects the NCAA will make a decision on the recommendation by October 2015 at the latest.
If the NCAA were to accept the recommendation, Fiorentino said a contingency plan of reapplication is in place.
This plan would only require 16 letters of support from interested universities.
“If they do accept it, there is a plan in place to reapply for emerging sport status,” Fiorentino said. “We already have the mandatory number of letters of support that would allow us to be reinstalled into that emerging sport category.”
Meanwhile, Williams considers equestrian’s future at Auburn to be bright regardless of the NCAA recommendation, and said he hopes to add a junior varsity team in the near future.
“Between Animal Science, the College of Veterinary Medicine and the equestrian sports and athletics, it’s a great synergy,” Williams said. “We have what could be one of the greatest on-campus groups.”
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