A celebratory occasion for women's sports at BU
By Brian Fitzgerald
There are no women athletes in the sports section of Boston University's 1948 yearbook. They did exist on campus, but to compete beyond the intramural level, they had to go off campus and play in local leagues.
"Back then, that was the only sports outlet available to college women," recalls Anne Coakley (SAR'48), who participated in four sports as a student. "Many women at BU had to take advantage of outside organizations such as the Boston Field Hockey Association."
Coakley will be one of eight alumnae to speak at a luncheon on Sunday, February 6, entitled Bridging Traditions (see sidebar). The event will honor BU women athletes from the 1930s through the 1990s.
"We want our present women athletes to have an idea of how their programs evolved," says Averill Haines, the assistant director of athletics and the senior woman administrator in the athletics department. "We also want our women athletes from the past, especially those who participated prior to the formal structure that now exists -- with funding and athletic scholarships -- to see how far their sports have come over the years."
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Varsity sailor Lynne Jewell Shore (SED'81) became the first woman to qualify for the men's collegiate single-handed championship. BU Photo Services |
In 1974, when Haines was hired by BU as coordinator of women's sports, there were no women's varsity teams. Female athletes at the University took part in intercollegiate competition, "but women's teams at BU weren't under the aegis of the athletic department," says Haines. "They were funded through the department of physical education, recreation, and dance."
In fact, some sports were financed by the athletes themselves. A few months before Haines came to BU, the Terrier women rowers went to Oakland, Ca., to compete in the open national championships. Women's crew, a club sport, rented a trailer from the men's crew for five cents a mile. Despite traveling such a considerable distance, the athletes won the open four and lightweight four championships, enabling them to represent the United States in the world championships in Lucerne, Switzerland.
Indeed, it's been a long road for women's athletics at colleges across the country. BU's program is a far cry from the days when women played basketball in pleated bloomers. With the elevation of women's golf, lacrosse, and soccer from club sports to varsity programs in the 1990s, Boston University now has 12 women's varsity sports teams -- the same number as their male counterparts.
"Following the rowing successes in the spring of 1974, President John Silber and the Board of Trustees decided that we should have varsity intercollegiate rowing at BU," says Haines. Varsity women's sports on campus began that fall with what Haines calls the "starting five" -- crew, basketball, swimming, sailing, and skiing.
A quarter-century of excellence
Thus began 25 years of women's varsity intercollegiate athletics at Boston University, with nationally ranked teams, athletes with All-America recognition, and national titles: the women's varsity heavyweight crews won the 1991 and 1992 NCAA championships.
"Scholarships for women athletes began in 1975 after Dr. Silber established an advisory committee, which was chaired by Assistant Provost Sister Madonna Murphy," Haines says. "During the 1975-76 season, BU became the first university in the East to establish need-based scholarships for women. The advisory committee and I worked with then-athletic director John Simpson to recommend to the administration which women's sports to emphasize and provide with full-time coaches. With these developments, we were soon able to attract such excellent athletes as Lynne Jewell Shore and Debbie Miller Palmore."
Shore (SED'81) won the Olympic gold medal in the 470 yachting event at the 1988 Seoul Games. Palmore (SED'81) scored more points than any other BU women's basketball player. She also holds University records for rebounds, assists, and blocked shots.
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Jennifer Lanctot O'Neill (SMG'91) is BU's first female three-time All-American. BU Photo Services |
"Debbie was an extraordinary talent," says Haines, who coached the team from 1976 to 1979. "I recruited her out of the Bronx. She turned our program around." Miller was on the gold medal-winning U.S. teams at the World University and Pan-Am Games. She was also a member of the 1980 U.S. Olympic women's basketball team, which was unable to compete because of the U.S. boycott of the Moscow Games after the USSR invaded Afghanistan.
Postcollegiate options
"Women's college basketball continues to make great strides," says Palmore, who will speak at the luncheon. "SEC and ACC games are regularly televised in Georgia, where I live. And there are many more opportunities for postcollegiate play now. The way it used to be, when an athlete was 21 and was just figuring out how to play the game, it was all over. Now they can play in the WNBA and other leagues." Palmore played pro hoops in Venezuela and England.
"The major factor in women's sports was Title IX," says Palmore, of the 1972 federal law that mandates equity in all programs at all schools receiving federal funds.
Jennifer Lanctot O'Neill (SMG'91) BU's first three-time woman All-American, also credits Title IX with boosting women's athletics programs nationwide. "It has opened up opportunities that I didn't have when I was looking at colleges," she says. "There is more scholarship money in women's track now." O'Neill, the head women's cross country coach at the University of Connecticut, will also speak at the luncheon.
Haines says that she is proud that BU now has a solid overall athletics program, with 24 sports, and that "we have developed our teams without compromising the University's academic prominence. I'm looking forward to the Bridging Traditions luncheon and seeing all these athletes back on campus. It will be another great moment in the history of women's sports at BU."