Illustrious history backs long-lasting university team

By: Lukas Eggen

Tuesday, November 10, 2009 - 2:02 AM

Nevada’s ski team, which began in 1936, is one of the school’s oldest and most successful sports programs at the university. Photo by Ricardo Lopez/Nevada Sagebrush

Nevada’s ski team has one of the most storied histories of any team at the school. The team was created in 1936 with the help of Wayne Poulsen, the founder of Squaw Valley USA resort and ski area. Since its inception, the ski team has hosted the NCAA’s first downhill skiing champion (Pat Meyers), won a national championship and had numerous All-Americans.

This long history has not been lost on current coaches.

“This team’s been around for over 70 years,” head alpine coach Evan Weiss said. “This team’s a lot bigger than the athletes we have out here and bigger than the administration. It’s had a long tradition.”

Since 1994, the ski team has finished in the top-10 at the NCAA Championships seven times, had 35 All-American athletes and has four individual titles.

One of those All-Americans was Chelsea Holmes, who competed for Nevada from 2006-09. Holmes said the ski team gave him some of the best times of her collegiate life.

“It was the best experience I had in college,” Holmes said. “I wouldn’t have traded it for anything.”

Warren Lerude, a journalism professor at the Reynolds School of Journalism, also has fond memories of competing for the ski team in 1956.

“For me, it was very thrilling to be on the University of Nevada ski team which had been a ranked team,” Lerude said.

And although they enjoyed their time, alumni are also impressed with the way the team has developed since they’ve been gone.

Cliff Whiteley, who was on the ski team from 1983-87, is pleased with the advancements made by the team.

“In the last 10 years, the team’s made big improvements,” Whiteley said.

Those improvements include five-straight top-10 team finishes at the NCAA Championships.

However, as news of the ski team’s situation was released, former athletes and coaches said they were surprised by the news.

“I was kind of shocked,” former Nevada coach Jeff Schloss said. “Nevada’s had a ski team since the late 1930s. The team seemed to get a little short sided.”

If the team is cut, Cameron Barnes, who raced for Nevada from 2005-08, thinks it will affect more than just the athletes involved.

“The ski team is a huge part of the community in the mountains,” Barnes said.

Part of the team’s involvement is the ski swap, which is being held this Friday, Saturday and Sunday. But if the ski team is lost, the ski swap’s future is unclear.

“Thousands of Reno families rely on the ski swap to buy equipment on a reasonable economic basis,” Lerude said.

Unfortunately, according to Whiteley, the ski team’s struggles to get funding are nothing new. In fact, the team operated as a club during the 1980s and early ’90s.

“Historically, it’s always been very difficult to get support,” Whiteley said. “I don’t know why it’s that way when so much of the community is involved in skiing.”

But with the ski team in danger of being cut, Lerude is quick to warn that Nevada would be losing much more than just a team.

“If the University of Nevada lost skiing, it would give up the heritage it has developed,” Lerude said. “Sixty-three years of heritage would go away.”

Lukas Eggen can be reached at leggen@nevadasagebrush.com.