Dana White & Meisha Tate Show Support For Boise State Wrestling
Dana White & Meisha Tate Show Support For Boise State Wrestling
UFC President Dana White and former champion Miesha Tate lent their support to the Save BSU Wrestling cause following a rally at the Idaho Board of Education offices in Boise.
UFC president Dana White tweeted his support for the #SaveBSUWrestling campaign following a rally by the movement at the Idaho Board of Education offices in Boise, ID, last weekend.
Former UFC champion Miesha Tate attended the rally along with hundreds of other supporters of Boise State's recently cut wrestling program. Tate expressed her disbelief at the decision by BSU president Bob Kustra and athletic director Curt Apsey to axe the program, especially the manner in which it was carried out.
"It's pretty sad to see colleges cutting wrestling programs," Tate said. "They're replacing the program with baseball, and I don't see why those two programs can't coexist.
The numbers of high school baseball players and wrestlers are nearly equal in Idaho, Washington, Oregon, Montana, and Wyoming: 20,551 baseball participants and 19,238 wrestling participants, according to data for the 2015-16 school year. In those same states there are 963 scholarships available to baseball-playing student athletes and just 235 available for wrestlers.
It has also been pointed out on Flo and in the Boise local paper of record that the average NCAA Division I baseball team costs over three times as much as what it costs to operate the Boise State wrestling program. A potential Broncos baseball team would also need to either build a stadium or pay for the use of an existing stadium.
A BSU baseball team would also have to build its alumni and support network nearly from scratch; whereas, wrestling already has a thriving community. Former Broncos Adam Hall, Andrew Hochstrasser, and Jason Chamberlain were all at the 2017 U.S. Open in Las Vegas this past weekend. Hochstasser finished in the top 12 in the 61kg division, while Jason Chamberlain placed sixth at 70kg and qualified for the World Team Trials to be held later this June. Hall helped coach the Wolfpack Wrestling Club team, whose highest finisher was 125kg champion Nick Gwiazdowski.
A petition to save the Boise State wrestling program has been signed over 15,000 times. You can find the petition online here. A fundraising campaign can be found here.
#SaveBSUWrestling @johnnyEBC pic.twitter.com/1JTSbKtxjL
— Dana White (@danawhite) May 1, 2017
Former UFC champion Miesha Tate attended the rally along with hundreds of other supporters of Boise State's recently cut wrestling program. Tate expressed her disbelief at the decision by BSU president Bob Kustra and athletic director Curt Apsey to axe the program, especially the manner in which it was carried out.
"It's pretty sad to see colleges cutting wrestling programs," Tate said. "They're replacing the program with baseball, and I don't see why those two programs can't coexist.
They cut the program after future athletes signed their letters of intent. Now those kids don't have the opportunity to go somewhere else and wrestle.Boise State wrestling alumni and former UFC fighter Johnny Nunez also attended the rally in an effort to hold Kustra and Apsey accountable for their decision.
The numbers of high school baseball players and wrestlers are nearly equal in Idaho, Washington, Oregon, Montana, and Wyoming: 20,551 baseball participants and 19,238 wrestling participants, according to data for the 2015-16 school year. In those same states there are 963 scholarships available to baseball-playing student athletes and just 235 available for wrestlers.
It has also been pointed out on Flo and in the Boise local paper of record that the average NCAA Division I baseball team costs over three times as much as what it costs to operate the Boise State wrestling program. A potential Broncos baseball team would also need to either build a stadium or pay for the use of an existing stadium.
A BSU baseball team would also have to build its alumni and support network nearly from scratch; whereas, wrestling already has a thriving community. Former Broncos Adam Hall, Andrew Hochstrasser, and Jason Chamberlain were all at the 2017 U.S. Open in Las Vegas this past weekend. Hochstasser finished in the top 12 in the 61kg division, while Jason Chamberlain placed sixth at 70kg and qualified for the World Team Trials to be held later this June. Hall helped coach the Wolfpack Wrestling Club team, whose highest finisher was 125kg champion Nick Gwiazdowski.
A petition to save the Boise State wrestling program has been signed over 15,000 times. You can find the petition online here. A fundraising campaign can be found here.