After a 22 year absence, The Phoenix has recently received leaked documents from the Administration officially approving the return of Swarthmore’s football team to the college’s athletic program.
The Athletic Department has been working tirelessly on this plan over the COVID-19 years as an extensive rebalancing of team budgets was required to conform to Title IX financial provisions on equal funding for men’s and women’s teams. The return of football will be accompanied by the addition of two new women’s sports teams that have yet to be specified.
The department is confident that with the new changes, the return of Swarthmore football will prove a financial and sporting success. All four fields on Cunningham will be covered with turf in order to construct a $4 million stadium project that will seat 2,000 spectators.
The admissions office is reportedly still unaware of the return of Swarthmore football, with many questions arising over how a team with over 40 athletes will be recruited without compromising Swarthmore’s rigorous academic standards. Unconfirmed sources have stated that the new addition to campus dining facilities was in part motivated by the need to accommodate the dietary needs of so many new athletes.
While the reaction of the student body is still unknown, it is confirmed that Swarthmore football will play its first game against Johns Hopkins on April 1, 2023. Go Garnet!
Well played
Amazing.
About time.
Saddest thing about how they abolished football was not doing it in the Quaker consensus tradition, just a big surprise done in secret, then leaving student athletes who came to play football left holding the bag. It was an elitist academic classist, racist way to treat students
Football is part of the college experience. While program has had its many downs, nothing beats a sunny Satiurday afternoon supporting friends who take to the football field. Nothing shows the character of Swarthmore football more than the perseverence of past football athletes like the Walsh brothers in the late 70.’s and early 80’s as a model of the student athlete
I go back a ways–one year shy of Neil Austrian–and was confused by the statement: “…with many questions arising over how a team with over 40 athletes will be recruited without compromising Swarthmore’s rigorous academic standards.” At least back in the ’60’s, the academic level of the football players on was representative of the college as a whole. For instance, Chris Prescott ’62 and captain of the team our senior year had perfect scores on the College Boards as a matriculating freshman. Many of us were in the honors program. It’s well known that athletic ability and intelligence are well correlated for men and women.