by Atticus Odias Bailey, staff writer
In an attempt to continue to reach the goal of obtaining 1200 students, Bryan College has included two new sports in addition to other changes currently under way at the college. A men’s and women’s golf team has been added, as well as a women’s slow pitch softball team.
The teams, who will participate in their first season during the 2010-2011 school year, will be officially launched with obtaining a coach to that will scout potential talent and students during the 2009-2010 school years.
“We’re real excited about the both the sports, especially women’s softball. It will be a great addition to our sport’s program. We’re the only school in the conference that does not offer women’s softball,” said Athletic Director Sandy Zensen.
Women’s softball has become a very popular sport in southern states. Bryan College, which offered softball in the mid 1980′s, was afraid of losing potential students due to a lack of a softball program.
“Both of these programs provide us an opportunity to grow as an institution, and that is part of the rational for bringing those sports on board. We’re looking at adding 20-25 athletes for softball, and 10-12 athletes for the golf team,” said Dr. Zensen.
Both sports will use facilities that the Dayton community can offer. The city of Dayton offers both a country club that will host the golf teams, and the softball facilities offered by the community will accommodate the softball team. Future plans may include Bryan’s own softball complex, but no definite plans have been made. The first priority is creating a successful softball team.
“Next month I will formal announcement to the NIAI and to the National Christian College Athletic Association indicating that we are looking for coaches in both of these sports,” said Zensen.
Concern has been raised that these sports might have the potential to take scholarship money available to the student body to entice future athletes to attend Bryan College. However, the scholarship money will be found from the sports department, and will not be taken from the student body.
The student body still has had mixed emotions concerning the two new sports.
“We have so much that still needs to be finished around the campus. We have a nice sport trainer building and program but can it really actively handle ten different sports with only three trainers? I guess I have mixed emotions,” said junior Taylor Gentry.
