Sonoma State University, located north of the San Francisco Bay Area in California, has announced that it will eliminate its entire NCAA Division II athletics department as being eliminated as part of a sweeping campus-wide cost-cutting measure with a larger-than-expected budget deficit looming.
A letter posted on the school’s website from interim campus president Emily Cutrer says that the school is facing a $23.9 million deficit, bigger than the projected $21 million deficit. Among the other cuts include 46 faculty cuts, closing of six entire academic departments, and a campus-wide hiring freeze.
The school’s athletics department will cease competition at the end of the spring season. Sonoma State has competed in the NCAA since 1964 and has won three NCAA Division II national championships (women’s soccer in 1990, men’s soccer in 2002, and men’s golf in 2009).
As has been the story at smaller colleges across the country, Cutrer blamed the budget deficit on shrinking enrollment. The student body has declined by 38% from its peak in 2015. In fall 2024, SSU had 5,784 students enrolled, with 5,191 of those being undergrads. That alone was a drop of almost 900 students from a year prior.
The cut to the athletics department is projected to save $3.7 million, with the total savings from the new austerity measures estimated at $20.1 million.
While the school didn’t support varsity swimming, diving, or water polo*, it is at least the second college we’ve seen do this in recent years after D1 St. Francis Brooklyn cut their athletics program in 2023. While there is a lot of fear about D1 cuts coming post House settlement (Cleveland State recently announced cuts of wrestling, women’s softball, and women’s golf), it is a canary in the coalmine for small colleges that are closing their doors at a record rate.
Sonoma State cut its women’s water polo program in 2020.
The pressure faced by smaller schools is caused by wholly different factors than those faced by D1 schools in the wake of the House settlement – including a Power 4 swimming program rumored to be on the chopping block at season’s end. Smaller D2 programs like Sonoma State and D2 swim programs like Emory & Henry continue to face budget crises driven outside of the athletics departments that are forcing spending cuts.
The school reported 110 men and 133 women on their varsity athletics teams this season. Even if all of those student-athletes were paying full-rate tuition (they aren’t), it would still barely cover the annual deficit of the athletics department.
Among the things that the school is famous for is baseball pitcher Marika Lyszczyk, who in 2020 became the first woman to play catcher in a men’s collegiate baseball game and is the first Canadian woman to play NCAA baseball.
The school says that it will honor athletic scholarships for those student-athletes who wish to remain at the school.
Wasn’t there a news this week that several of Big Ten athletic departments were bleeding cash and running deficits, including Ohio State, UCLA, etc? Does this bode well for everyone else?
They had a water polo program until 2020 or 2021. Not sure about swimming.
I am so glad my mid level mid major daughter is almost done with college swimming. I fear for the swimmers that make up the vast majority of D1 swimmers (Futures level out of HS) and all the divisions below them.
Division 3 will be fine. Top of division 3 is better than most mid majors anyways. Swimmers will still have options, just not maybe division 1 as much
But will they have the options financially?
All the P4 kids not scoring and acting entitled, be careful what you ask for. Might be a blessing these schools are only reducing roster sizes instead of cutting the whole program. There are a lot of smaller DI, II and III schools with swim teams to attend
Is the rumored school in the Big Ten?
I hate hearing these stories.
Well done article, Braden. As a former dean, I can attest to the crisis level reactions of schools, many of them ones that you wouldn’t expect to be worried. Declining enrollment is real, it’s a simple demographic fact, and small and mid sized schools that are not truly excellent and have overspent on facilities and bloated administrations will suffer first.
Well, the Cal State schools don’t have all the sports. Fullerton one time got rid of football and then brought it back later. I found out that when Fullerton was division II school back in the 1970’s they had a swim team. Now only water polo. Fullerton is good at baseball and won the NCAA’s three times. Also, about 2 years ago played the first round of March Madness in Basketball. So, a cal state school getting rid of sports is not surprising. Also, you are right about enrollment, the Cal State schools get less out of state or international than the UC schools. California has been declining in birth rates like most states.
Could it be we are seeing declining enrollment, in part, the notion the undergraduate experience needs a revamping in our country? For that matter, our entire K-12 programs are displaying unsettling testing deficiencie. In my experience, from traveling to many different nations and cultures, education is approached quite differently from what presented in the USA. While this trend might be construed as problematic, a shift in our societal and educational vectors hopefully will right the ship!
The biggest factor in declining enrollment is the demographic trough that we approach – financial insecurities (2008-2010 financial crisis) caused a lot of individuals to examine when and if they were going to have children. There simply are fewer 16-18 year olds in the next 4 years then there have been