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Wednesday, July 16, 2014
The Michigan Daily - michigandaily.com
Yost After Hours:A'M' women's hockey
eklySummerEdition Michigaaiyco
ONE-HUNDRED-TWENTY FOUR YEARS OF EDITORIAL FREEDOM Wednesday. July 16.2014
By DAVID MALINOWSKI
Daily Sports Writer
Entering Yost Ice Arena with
the women's hockey team on the
ice is like walking into an office
after hours. It's one of the most
historic college rinks in the coun-
try, but the lights are half-dimmed
and the building is cold. The muf-
fled sounds of skates and pucks
fill the air. Winged helmets move
about the ice, but the wings are in
yellow tape on store-bought navy
helmets.
This is not the perennial cham-
pionship-contending men's team
coached by Red Berenson. This is
Michigan women's hockey. This is
a team where reality hits its play-
ers square in the face with every
drop of sweat.
Still, it's life for players who
have passed up bigger opportuni-
ties to play here.
"You need something to kind of
keep you going, and that for me is
hockey," said sophomore alternate
captain Jenna Trubiano.
Offered a roster spot on a var-
sity squad elsewhere, she instead
chose to play closer to her New
Baltimore,
nities for girls to play hockey in
the state of Michigan after high
school. While there was a Division
I team at Wayne State in Detroit, it
folded after succumbing to finan-
cial pressure. There are now just
two programs in the state - Fin-
landia University and Adrian Col-
lege - both Division III.
"As a female hockey player, the
number one thing you have to look
at is academics, but I think it's
kind of ridiculous that there's not
a women's D-I team to pursue in
the state of Michigan," Trubiano
said. "It's embarrassing, actually."
Susan McDowell is officially an
assistant coach for the women's
hockey team, but her experience
with the sport goes back decades.
She co-founded the team in 1994
and played at the college level.
It has been 17 years since wom-
en's hockey was up for varsity
appointment at Michigan. In 1997,
the Athletic Department put three
women's sports up for varsity-
appointment - soccer, water polo
and hockey - to choose two.
"(Women's
Ann Arbor. MI
JAYLLACANTILINA/Daily
Jenna Trubianoand Monica Koronwont fulfill the dream uf playing Michigan varsity hockey, but they maintain hope for the future.
Michigan home.
The desire that
brought her here "Yo u
started when
she was 10 with somet
a Detroit Red
Wings game on kind of
TV.
"My fam- going,
ily wasn't hock-
ey-oriented for me is
- nobody else
(in my family)
played it," she
said. "I saw Henrik Zetterberg
make this one move on TV and I
told my dad I wanted to do that."
A rising fifth-year senior, Ann
Arbor native Monica Korzon,
captained AAA Detroit Honey-
baked to a state championship and
played several seasons at SUNY
Plattsburgh in upstate New York,
winning two D-III national cham-
pionships.
"My dad really wanted a son,
and he never got one," Korzon
said. "His equivalent was turn-
ing his four daughters into hockey
players. For me, it's a family sport.
When it's cold enough on Christ-
mas morning, we'll play pond
hockey.
"I love hockey. It's who I am."
There are almost no opportu-
hockey was) in
top priority,"
need McDowell said.
"The board of
hing to control recom-
mended that we
keep you go to the Board
of Regents."
and that Soccer was
selected, leav-
s hockey." ing water polo
and hockey as
the remaining
two sports for
promotion.
"They ended up taking water
polo," McDowell said. "The anec-
dotal information was that water
polo was going to be a $350,000
a year investment (all-inclusive),
whereas ice hockey would have
been a $750,000-800,000 deal."
The justification for the
appointment ranges from travel
costs to facility maintenance. At
the time, Canham Natatorium was
entering just its seventh year of
operation, having enough capacity
to support an extra team.
Soccer already had practice
fields and game fields in place,
leaving the question of how to
divide ice time at Yost Arena. The
process never got that far, and ice
hockey was tabled for females due
to facility and fiscal constraints.
Promoting the longtime club
sport to varsity status would pres-
ent a couple of issues. First is Title
IX, which could require the school
to add another men's sport to
accompany the addition of wom-
en's varsity hockey.
Furthermore, in order for
Michigan to maintain two varsity
hockey programs in the eyes of
the Athletic Department, it needs
two rinks, as opposed to moving
the women into Yost with the
men.
"It's not impossible," Athletic
Director Dave Brandon told The
Detroit News in January. "But,
if you were to do it the right way,
which is the Michigan way, you'd
build a facility with two sheets of
ice."
Building another facility would
add a hefty startup fee to travel
and maintenance costs for the new
varsity sport.
"It would certainly draw some
fan attraction, as all of our teams
do," Brandon told the News. "But
I'm sure the fan interest in it
would be far below the cost of the
program."
In the late 1990s, one of Michi-
gan's chief rivals, Ohio State,
forged onward with creating
women's teams. Using a selective
process, a group of athletic offi-
cials decided to create women's
programs that would parallel
existing men's spot
Among addition
en's lacrosse and
State added a wom
program to the var
The program fa
uphill battles in a
Like the state of r
lacks a large popu
en's hockey player
ing pool is very t
extra costs on rec
the east coast, Can
and even Europe,t
sports don't have1
field a complete
roster.
"Decisions
are made on
the possibilities
of the recruit-
ing pool," said
Miechelle Wil-
lis, the school's
Executive
Director of Ath-
letics. "We knew
what we were
getting into, but
it wasn't a sig-
nificant enough hu
the sport."
Other obstacle
faced were compet
ties.
Ohio State want
program live up to
mantra: The trav
academics, studen
competition all ha
tional.
"Adding sports
rts. sions, dropping sports are tough
s such as wom- decisions, but every campus
rowing, Ohio looks at their environments, their
hen's ice hockey opportunities for national com-
sity fold. petitiveness," Willis said. "What
aced a litany of may work here might not work
ll departments. there."
Michigan, Ohio McDowell circled back to
lation of wom- finding money for the program
rs. The recruit- through benefactors.
hin, leading to "Do I target the alumni and ask
ruiting trips to them 'Hey, have you loved this
ada, Minnesota sport? Has it given something
costs that other to you?' " she said. "Do you give
to deal with to something at a bigger level to more
people at a more
formal-level
commitment?"
"I'msure the For now,
there's not much
fan interest in she can do. Play-
far ers have come
it would be far and gone, games
have been won
below the cost and lost, but
Sfor the players,'
of the program. longtime dream
of playing Mich-
igan varsity
hockey, time is
insie
ART FAIR SPECIAL
Map and info
Need help finding your
way around this iconic Ann
Arbor event?
>> SEE PAGE 7
NEWS
A second city
Students find their niche
and a sense of community
in Detroit.
>> SEE PAGE 14
OPINION
Open doors
From the Daily: The 'U'
needs to better uphold the
Open Meetings Act.
>>SEE PAGE 4
ARTS
Hellion
The story of struggles in
one Texas town delivers
with flawed characters
>>SEE PAGE 10
SPORTS
Yost after hours
The women's hockey club
team struggles to find its
place on South Campus
>>SEE PAGE 16
INDEX
Vo. CXXIV, .No 5 l2n14 The Michigan Daily
N EW S ....................................2
O PIN IO N ...............................4
A RT FA IR ...............................7
A RTS ....................................10
CLASSIFIEDS......................12
CROSSWORD....................12
SPORTS ..............13
ALLISON FARRAND/Daily
LEFT: President Mark Schlissel and Governor Rick Snyder pose for a photo after an informal chat on Schlissel's first day in
office. RIGHT: The University's new president spins the cube outside the Fleming Administration Building Monday.
ADMINISTRATION
'U' sued over violations
of Open Meetin gs Act
CAMPUS LIFE
Ceremony
honors N
Hall before
demolition
ROTC members,
officers and alumni
say goodbye to
historic building
By MICHAEL SPAETH
For the Daily
Friday, members of the Univer-
sity's Reserve Officers Training
Corps held a small ceremony on
the front lawn of North Hall to pay
tribute to the building they called
home for 74 years in advance of its
scheduled demolition.
The building is being demol-
ished to make room for the new
300,000-square foot Biological
Science Building, approved by the
University's Board of Regents in
February, which will house the
Department of Molecular, Cellu-
lar and Developmental Biology, the
Department of Ecology and Evo-
lutionary Biology, and collections
from the Anthropology, Natural
History, Paleontology and Zoology
museums.
At the event, current and retired
members of the University's Air
Force, Army and Navy ROTC units
adapted the traditional Naval
decommissioning ceremony, which
signifies the end of a Naval ship's
active service, to mark the end of
North Hall's service to the Univer-
sity.
Captain Joseph Evans, professor
of Naval Science and Commander
of the University's Naval ROTC,
said though the building was never
commissioned as a ship, it served
the same symbolic purpose.
"North Hall, muchlike anynaval
ship, faithfully served us all and all
See ROTC, Page 3
O
t
I.
W1
3i
zI
Detroit Free Press
heads push for more
transparency in
regent's decisions
By SHOHAM GEVA
ManagingNews Editor
In a lawsuit filed in state claims
court Friday, The Detroit Free
Press sued the University over vio-
lations of the Open Meetings Act
in connection with meetings of
the University's Board of Regents,
alleging that most decisions on
University issues are made in
private and votes during official
meetings are just a formality.
The lawsuit relies primarily on
a Free Press analysis of regents
meetings between January and
February of 2014 which found
that out of the 116 votes held, the
Regents held discussion on only
12 and a no vote by one or more
Regentsonly occurred eight times. about official business or policy.
"These numbers establish More generally, the state Con-
clearly that the regents do, in stitution requires that all formal
fact, routinely discuss the issues meetings of public bodies be open
they must decide and do routinely to the public. However, regents
make their decisions about the often meet informally to discuss
University of Michigan's gover- issues, separate from the monthly
nance, all behind closed doors, out meetings, which are considered
of the public's view, without public formal. These meetings generally
accountability, and in violation of include two or three regents as
the (Open Meetings Act) and its well as University officials.
Constitutional obligations," the The lawsuit also cited two
lawsuit read. regents meetings held January
The Open Meetings Act is a 1976 2013 and January 2014 in Califor-
state law dictating the conduct of nia and New York, which it said
the meetings of public bodies such violated the Act because public
as the regents. It mandates that notice was not provided, minutes
all gatherings between members were not taken, or the public and
of those boards, given that they members of the press were not
meet certain criteria to qualify as a allowed to attend.
meeting, must be open to the pub- In an interview with the Free
lic with advance notice and have Press, Paul Anger, Free Press edi-
a record kept, among other provi- tor and publisher, said especially
sions. The law defines a meeting as given the scope and scale of the
any situation where more than a University, he's concerned about
simple majority of members of the the lack of transparency to the
board are present and discussion public the analysis of meetings
involves decision or discussion See LAWSUIT, Page 3
rdle to preclude
s Ohio State
ition and facili-
ted to have the
their athletics
'el, equipment,
it services and
d to be excep-
are tough deci-
running out.
"I think there's a sense of inevi-
tability with the participants of
the current program, because it's
not going to happen while they're
here," McDowell said. "They are
looking around and seeing are
where their peers are playing,
wondering where their younger
sisters are going, and it's not get-
ting the support it needs across
the state. That's the struggle."