Webster U. Snags Texas Tech’s Chess Coach and 10 Top Players

February 15, 2012, 11:09 am

Big-time college sports teams routinely pluck coaches from smaller programs with fewer resources. Today The New York Times reported on a different sort of coaching raid: Webster University, a private institution in suburban St. Louis, has hired away the head of Texas Tech University’s elite chess program. Susan Polgar, a grandmaster and former women’s world champion, has been at Texas Tech since 2007. Last April her team won the Final Four of Chess. Now she is taking her husband, who manages the team, along with Texas Tech’s top 10 players to Webster, which previously had no chess program. Ms. Polgar told the NBC television affiliate in Lubbock, Tex., that Texas Tech’s chess program had grown too quickly for the university to accommodate it, but a university spokesman disputed that characterization. Webster will finance the new program from its endowment.

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steve_a

Gee. . . and I thought things had gotten out of hand with football
and basketball.

Next comes illegal recruitment, acceptance of marginal
students just because they can play chess, academic cheating to keep them
eligible, and boosters paying thousands of dollars for their pocket protectors, resulting in
NCAA investigations.
rescomp

Hmmmmm…I am in a “grain of salt” mood. Is there a National Collegiate Chess Association (NCCA)? If so, I am thinking a first class investigation is called for! This is going to kill Texas Tech’s chess recruiting for years to come. Webster stole 10 of the “top players”…how the heck many people are on a chess team? I am also confused by Ms. Polgar’s claim that the chess program had grown too quickly and that Texas Tech could no longer accommodate the program? What does that mean? I am sure the university could afford any number of chess sets. I am assuming that, even at the highest level, chess players don’t need uniforms or special facilities with locker rooms and showers. I’m having a real hard time imagining how a chess program could grow so big that a major university could not support it. I suppose there are travel costs — but again this gets back to how many people are on a chess team? Athletic teams often have a smaller traveling squad….maybe that was an option never explored? Ah well, Webster wins this battle, but I’m thinking sweet revenge will provide supreme motivation for what’s left of the chess program in Lubbock forever.
steve_a

well, there’s travel and lodging for matches and recruiting plus the coach’s and team manager’s salaries. There are only marginally more expenses for a tennis team (minimally comprised of 6 players) and the University of Maryland claimed they could not afford that team any more.
vectors

I wonder if they will have to sit out a season before they are allowed to participate!
steve_a

players only have to sit out a year in Football and basketball so these guys are safe
madmofi

And Steve, you say this based on what exactly?
Chess as an Olympic sport has been around and yet you don’t hear all that you mention.
not sure what the narrow view.
steve_a

based on the vulturing of a coach, a manager, and most of a team suggesting that collegiate chess has reached the big-time status of the other revenue-generating sports and that the inevitable abuses are likely to follow