Little Thanks for Thanksgiving

By Don Mahler

Valley News Sports Editor

It was Sunday afternoon, and the living was easy. The Dartmouth swimmers, fresh off their double win over Vermont, put their suits away and met with coach Joann Brislin.

With just four days until Thanksgiving, their spirits were high. Sure, finals were staring at them when they returned, but the long winter break was just around the corner. It was a festive time. Nothing like a victory sweep to brighten the outlook.

Meeting with her team, Brislin told them they had a lot to be thankful for this year. Their parents, their school, their friends. But most importantly, they should be thankful for the opportunity to compete at Dartmouth, and all that it stood for.

Be thankful, she impressed upon her impressionable group. This was a time to be thankful.

Not any more.

At 8 a.m. the following morning, Dartmouth athletic director Josie Harper met with swim coaches Brislin, Jim Wilson and Chris Hamilton and dropped her bombshell: The program was done as of March.

It was a budget thing. Nothing personal. It was a bad year for the market. The college was looking to tighten its fiscal belt. There was a $262,000 target on the athletic department. Cutting swimming would net a cool $212 grand.

It was all about numbers. The athletic department just couldn't maintain 34 varsity teams effectively and competitively. So instead of nibbling from programs across the board, the college was going to take just one big bite. Out of swimming.

There was nothing this group had to be thankful for now.

It is always difficult to put a face on budget cuts.

Budget cuts always happen to somebody else. They are always somebody else's problem. It is always about money saved, not lives turned upside down.

The bean counters see portraits of dead presidents. For the $212,000, you just fill the ledger with 40 James Madisons and 12 Grover Clevelands. Kind of impersonal that way, isn't it? No pain, just paper money.

But put the money away for a moment and just look at the people. There are real people being affected by these cuts; real people losing their jobs; real people losing their sport; real people losing their college.

People like:

* Chuck Zarba. He got the phone call early Monday morning. It was his daughter, Nicole, a freshman swimmer. Like the other freshmen on the team, she had just begun to feel at home in Hanover. The team had become her surrogate family. The college experience was everything she thought it would be. Then came the news.

“She called Monday in tears,” said her father, who drove up from Beverly, Mass., on Tuesday to listen to Dean of the College Jim Larimore explain the college's reasons for dropping the swimming and diving program. “She was devastated.

“Since she was 6 years old, she's wanted to come to Dartmouth,” said Zarba, clutching at his Dartmouth jersey. “And she made it. I bought this jersey 12 years ago, just waiting for her to see her dream come true. Now, we're really going to have to think about whether to stay here or not. I hate to think that way, but that's just the reality.”

After Tuesday's protest rally, Zarba headed to pick up his daughter for the Thanksgiving holiday. “I don't have any answers right now,” he said. “It's too early; it hurts too much.”

* Diving coach Chris Hamilton. Hamilton had a decision to make. There was an opening at Penn last summer; was he interested? While the program was tempting, Hamilton turned down the job.

“I stayed here for my kids -- the divers,” he said. “And the tradition. The other coaches in the department are fabulous. I couldn't get this anywhere else.”

But Hamilton, his wife and two young children will be going somewhere else next year after his program was dropped on Monday. “We were offered no other jobs at Dartmouth. Just received our severance package and that was it,” said Hamilton. “I have no idea what I'll do next.”

* Freshman diver Kate Brodie. When Brodie woke up Monday morning, her blitzmail was being blitzed. There was a message from Harper, another from her coach and others from teammates. They all said the same thing: “They're dropping the program.”

Brodie hurried over to Alumni Gym, disbelieving. “It wasn't until I saw guys coming out of that room in tears that I knew it was true,” Brodie said two days later. “I don't think I ever saw so many guys crying.”

For Brodie, Dartmouth was the answer to her collegiate dreams. “I came to Dartmouth because I wanted a great education, because I love the outdoors and I love to dive,” she said. “Dartmouth was the only school that had all three, where I could do it all. Now it feels like it's all been taken away.”

The college had stretched its varsity obligations too thin, said Harper. Thirty-four varsity teams for 4,300 undergraduates were just too much, said Larimore. There was too much strain and not enough resources to go around.

The coaches were asked to choose between an across-the-board 2.7-percent cut of their programs' budgets or one large cut from one program, according to Harper and Larimore. It was done individually and in private. Without general campus input or public discussion. This way, no one would be seen as selfish or spiteful, they said.

But it was a loaded question. It is a wicked and divisive method of leadership to pit coaches against coaches, programs against programs and athletes against athletes.

So today, 33 teams can breathe a little easier. But at what cost?

Today, three coaches have lost their jobs. Fifty-three swimmers and divers have lost their program.

Some years, Thanksgiving isn't all it's cracked up to be.

Don Mahler can be reached at dmahler@vnews.com.