Reusse: Despite Pushback Chris Voelz Made the U Better

[Ignatius L Hoops]

Chris Voelz took on challenges — and sportswriters — to fight for U women's sports

Voelz, the long-time women's athletic director, worked When Chris Voelz was women's athletic director, she battled for facilities that are vital to Gophers women's sports today — and with a couple of Star Tribune columnists who didn't get it.

www.startribune.com

Reusse Interviews Voelz:

This was part of a phone interview with Voelz last week that went for 53 minutes. It was outstanding even before it started, with this return text to the interview request from Voelz:

"Sorry, I'm only doing interviews with recovering sexists … oh, right, it appears you might qualify."

 

[Ignatius L Hoops]

There was also this nugget:

Frese took off for Maryland after that one season. She has turned the Terps into a power, including a 2006 national championship. Voelz was on the way out, but wanted to find the next coach.

"Lindsay [Whalen] was going to be a junior," Voelz said. "There were two leading candidates. I had Lindsay meet with both for breakfast on campus, explain the team we had coming back, and then give me her reaction.

"We went with Pam Borton and the Gophers were in the Final Four two years later."

Whalen, now the Gophers head coach, confirmed that story this week.

 

[gophertime]

Everything I knew about Chris Voelz I probably got from Sid or Pat and yet I'm not sure why but this amused me.

"One of the best daily fundraising methods for me at Minnesota should be attributed to you and Sid. Every time you wrote in opposition to me, or Gopher women, or women in sports, I would get a call from Kathleen Ridder to meet her at the Minneapolis Club for lunch. She would sit with me in a prominent place and, as Sally Pillsbury, or Marilyn Tickle Bryant, or Maxine Nathanson, or Gladys Brooks, et al, walked by, they would refer to the article and get out their checkbooks. And I would go back to the Bierman Building with more resources for our women."

 

[tripledouble]

Loved the text referring to Patrick as a recovering sexist. As most of us look back on Title IX, I think it's fair to say that it really expedited the growth of women's sports. I'm an old fart, but I never was a sports sexist. But there were people like Patrick and Sid who certainly were. When I was in high school in the late '60s/early '70s, women couldn't even compete in varsity sports. They had something then called the GAA (Girls Athletic Association). It was a shame to see that girls/women were prohibited from participating at the same level as boys do. And do sports sexists still exist? Yes, they do. Although not nearly at the level they did before, maybe because most males have now had daughters or granddaughters who have participated in sports by now. But even on this forum, I read a post from someone last week who was wondering why women play with a smaller basketball than men. Does anyone really care? Yeah, he may well have just been trolling and trying to get a reaction, but the thoughts are not that far removed. You go, girls!

 

[HitMeAgainIAmStillMoving]

Loved the text referring to Patrick as a recovering sexist. As most of us look back on Title IX, I think it's fair to say that it really expedited the growth of women's sports. I'm an old fart, but I never was a sports sexist. But there were people like Patrick and Sid who certainly were. When I was in high school in the late '60s/early '70s, women couldn't even compete in varsity sports. They had something then called the GAA (Girls Athletic Association). It was a shame to see that girls/women were prohibited from participating at the same level as boys do. And do sports sexists still exist? Yes, they do. Although not nearly at the level they did before, maybe because most males have now had daughters or granddaughters who have participated in sports by now. But even on this forum, I read a post from someone last week who was wondering why women play with a smaller basketball than men. Does anyone really care? Yeah, he may well have just been trolling and trying to get a reaction, but the thoughts are not that far removed. You go, girls!

I am from the same era and it embarrasses me now how women were ignored in sports.

 

[short ornery norwegian]

It's kind of weird that Pat Reusse and Jim Souhan are now crusaders for womens' sports.

Reusse got into a twitter fight with some people over the Scalia news. Reusse's point was that a lot of people who are throwing out the "doom-and-gloom" tweets over Scalia probably don't watch Gopher women's games or attend them in person.

 

[JellyBean2144]

Great article. Thanks for sharing.