By Matt Turer — mturer@ky3.com
@MattTurer
Their names are Jordan Besore, Josie Cook, Ginny Dalton, Allison Huddleson, Niamh Sexton, Meghan Strite and Audrey Tabor. Heartbroken and without a clear path, this is the story of the seven Missouri State field hockey commits left to fight for their future in the sport they love just weeks away from high school graduation after the university suddenly cut the 51-year-old program.
“It feels like someone has quit for me,” Tabor, one of two commits who were set to join Missouri State field hockey from Sacred Heart Academy in Louisville, Kentucky, said over the phone Monday.
“I was out of the country and wasn’t with my parents when I heard and I just started crying. This obviously wasn’t our choice or anything. It’s just so late in the game. Most people have their teams figured out. If I did want to play [somewhere else], it’s just forced. Wherever we can be put is where we’re going to go. That’s how I’m most disappointed. I’m just trying to look at the big picture for what I want to do. But I definitely don’t want to be a transfer in college.”
Tabor’s disinterest in transferring makes Missouri State’s offer to honor the scholarships of the seven commits for one year borderline irrelevant. Instead, Tabor, who received a Miss Kentucky Field Hockey nomination this year, is attempting to gain late admission to the University of Kentucky, a school without a field hockey program. Meaning that, yes, she’s on the verge of essentially being forced to abandon the sport she’s played and loved since grade school. And she isn’t alone.
“At this point, I’m so heartbroken about the entire situation, I’m not sure if I even want to continue my field hockey career anymore,” Strite, Tabor’s teammate at Sacred Heart, said. “I’ve been committed to MSU for almost a year now, and the thought of playing anywhere else brings tears to my eyes.”
Strite picked up the sport in third grade and grew into one of the best goaltenders in Kentucky, receiving second-team all-state honors and an All-American nomination her senior season.
“I fell in love with the sport [as a kid] and never thought it would end like this,” she said. “I’ve talked a lot with Audrey [Tabor]. There’s nothing to describe what both we are feeling besides pure disappointment. We are absolutely devastated that we will never be given the chance to play together like we had been anticipating for quite some time now.”
These are the unseen casualties of Missouri State’s decision last Monday to cut the program with little-to-no warning, saving $300,600 from the athletic budget while simultaneously backing both current student-athletes and these once future seven into a dark and potentially expensive corner.
The cut came as part of a plan to reduce the athletic department’s spending by $750,000 after state funding withholdings and budget cuts were announced in February. Director of Athletics Kyle Moats said the decision to cut an entire program—and adding beach volleyball as a replacement to stay within Title IX standards—was made so as to not sacrifice the competitiveness of sports across the board. Missouri State football has not had more than six wins in a season since 1996 and the men’s basketball program is 88-106 the past seven years. It remains to be seen if the field hockey cuts will improve the competitiveness of the two programs under Moats’ watch.
“The first time I visited [Missouri State] I had a really good connection with coach [Catherine Ostoich] and the facilities and the campus,” Tabor said. “I could for sure see myself there. I had a friend going there from home. My parents liked it. My sisters liked it. I had a really good scholarship, which would have helped. The tuition for me was going to be lower than what it cost for me to go to school in Kentucky. My family really had it figured out in that category.”
Not all of the seven commits were entering MSU on full athletic scholarships, but even for those on partial scholarships or those combined with academic ones, a little bit helps. Suddenly, these students and families are potentially faced with a financial decision they didn’t expect to have to face this coming fall or, at the very least, the three following school years.
“Honestly, we just can’t believe it,” Ginny Dalton, one of two in-state commits, said. “We have cried together, actually. We were going to be roommates and thought we had figured it all out.”
Dalton picked up the sport at Parkway South in Manchester her freshman year, growing at an accelerated rate and setting the school record for goals despite missing most of her senior season with a torn ACL. After attending high school just outside St. Louis, she thought she had a chance to play the sport close to home. Now that chance is likely gone.
“I am not thrilled about being a plane ride away from my loved ones, plus my sister goes to MSU and just loves it. To me, it was a dream come true. It fit all my criteria for what I was looking for in a four-year school,” Dalton said.
“I truly, honestly felt blessed to be offered a scholarship to play here. I had torn my ACL last spring and thought it was all over. When coach Ostoich offered me a spot a week before my surgery, I thought I was dreaming. I was so grateful. And I worked super hard to get back on the field. So, yeah, this just feels like a bad joke honestly.”
Dalton returned from surgery in time for the playoffs this past fall, pushing Parkway South into the Sweet 16. What she said next probably best sums up the current situation for all seven of these recruits:
“It is extremely emotional. It’s the 11th hour and while I should be enjoying my prom and graduation, I am completely stressed about what I should do for my college future. Do I de-commit and hope that I can find a spot somewhere else? It’s a big gamble at this late stage of the game. As a signee, I also have to be realistic that whatever spots are open there are potentially 20-plus current field hockey players who would be competing for those spots. One thing I will say is that I have to remind myself that before coach Ostoich had offered me the spot on her team, she asked me if I liked MSU. She said that I shouldn’t say yes just for field hockey; that I should love the school first and foremost because I should never pick a college just for the sport. I have been thinking a lot about those words. It kills to be so unbelievably excited about your next four years as a field hockey player and then have it ripped away. To not ever get to step on the field as a collegiate player. But I am trying to keep it all in perspective and make the right decision for my future. I have lots of notebooks with pros and cons.”
Dalton, Strite and Tabor were the only three who wrote back to requests for comment for this story. One of the remaining four, Niamh Sexton, is an international product out of Cork, Ireland. None of the recruits I spoke to have heard from Sexton—who may now be in a more difficult situation than any of the other six—since the announcement. Sexton would have joined an MSU roster with five international players returning next season.
“It’s tough,” Ostoich said. “Because D1, you’re done [recruiting] a year in advance. A lot of D1s have reached out but they don’t have money left. Some of [the commits] will get lucky and be able to find a spot [without a full scholarship], and if their parents can help them financially, that will help, but most will likely have to go D2 or D3. They’re smart girls so most can probably get academic money too.”
So far, one of Ostoich’s seven recruits has landed a Division 1 home next year, with Allie Huddleson, a Pennsylvania recruit who’s aunt and uncle attended Missouri State in the 1970s, receiving an offer from Mid-American Conference rival Central Michigan.
“We had some really great girls coming here. Good athletes, but good people. This last week all my staff has been doing is trying to get girls places to go,” Ostoich said. “I just keep reaching in and reminding them there’s something better that will come from this. Everything happens for a reason and I firmly believe that even during these tough times.”
The efforts from Ostoich, who’s in her first year of coaching at MSU, haven’t gone unnoticed.
“My respect for coach Ostoich through all of this has only grown,” Strite said. “To say her hands are tied would be an understatement. She is trying her absolute best to get her girls recruited.”
Bianca Mills is one of six outgoing seniors on the current roster of 17, and one of 13 out-of-state players. Mills and MSU played their final home game last Saturday, beating alumni 3-1 in an exhibition in front of a packed Allison North Stadium decorated with signs of support for the team and protest for MSU administration.
CLICK HERE FOR PHOTOS OF SATURDAY’S ALUMNI GAME
“If I was an incoming freshman, I’d look at this as your first challenge as a D1 player,” Mills, from Huntington Beach, Calif., said. “Playing D1 is challenging mentally and physically, and it makes you a better person. I hope they’d look at this that way and their game will grow immensely if they go somewhere.”
For some, that somewhere might still be Missouri State, a school they fell in love with over the past year. But that would mean abandoning what brought them to MSU in the first place.
“There was no warning for the recruits nor the team whatsoever,” Dalton said. “It was definitely not believable. I swore it was an April Fool’s joke.”
