I agree. I get the whole landscape of equestrian is small, but I also have not heard a ton about STUNT either as a d1 sport (I don’t mean that as a diss but a legit question/personal observation)? In a perfect world we could have both but personally something like women’s rowing going d1 seems more obvious?

Disappointing. I thought it was a classy part of our program. But I think I understand the point because the sport is going nowhere as far as the NCAA is concerned. Also it is a very expensive program to operate even with our Vet School footing a lot of the expenses. Stunt seems to me to be a very SEC oriented sport. I don’t see any other high level schools in the west doing this. I may be very wrong though.

After a great amount of thought and conversations with my owners, handlers, trainers, groomers, ferriers, and veterinarians, I have decided to enter the transfer portal. This was not an easy decision and comes with great appreciation for the entire Aggie community, particularly my stablemate, Gunrock. That community has welcomed me, supported me and believed in me from the time I was a young colt. I will always carry wonderful memories of the Davis experience down whatever paths I may roam.

Thank you to everyone who has been a part of this chapter of my life.

Happy trails to you,

Buttermilk.

I too have thought that the equestrian team was a unique part of UCD athletics. The program fits well with UCD's role as an agricultural college and home of a top veterinary school.

If a new sport is to be added I think crew would be a better choice than competitive cheerleading, er, stunt.

I agree that having an Equestrian team fit with the UCD heritage/culture, and I would love to have it continue.

Unfortunately, I also understand that Equestrian is an expensive sport to operate. In addition to the cost of scholarships, uniforms, coaching and support staff salaries, general equipment similar to all other varsity sports there are equine-athlete costs and facility costs. Just feeding one horse, depending on the price of hay, can $5,000 or more a month. There's also another $1500/month per horse for routine veterinary and farrier care. And there's no skipping on any of this if you want the horses ready for competition.

So I can easily see that the savings by replacing Equestrian with Stunt will be significant.

As I recall, one of the thoughts behind adding equestrian as a IC sport was that there was potentially big donor money involved--I wonder if that never panned out?

I think that when the sport was made a varsity sport at the DI level at Davis there was expectation that the NCAA would follow through and that it would become a true NCAA sport. That obviously never happened and probably never will. As previously mentioned, it’s way too expensive and very few colleges field an equestrian team, especially in the western United States. STUNT is a growing sport, but there are still very few colleges that offer it as an NCAA sport in California. I sometimes wonder why UC Davis is so concerned about compliance with Title IX while most all DI schools out west appear to care less about that issue.

I'm sure shells/boats are expensive and that tranpsorting them is also expensive, but seems to me that crew is popular enough on the west coast and would add enough numbers to the Title IX formula that it would be a better sport than stunt or field hockey.

All sports involve some judgment and some physical fitness, but I prefer the ones where the winner relies more on physical attributes which can (hopefully) be measured objestively rather than sports which are so reliant on the opinion of judges. The Olympic motto is "Faster, Higher, Stronger," not "Better in the opinion of some judges."

Having said that, gymnasts are some of the most physically fit athletes around, so what do I know?

The decision to kill the D1 Equestrian team in the middle of another competitive season is cruel. 40+ women athletes have to re-consider their options. In coming recruited Freshmen athletes have been left without a team. The Equestrian parents have donated the majority of the expenses yet the AD did not communicate with anyone until Friday evening. That is not transparency. The athletic program still continued to take our donations all the while knowing this cut was looming. This is misappropriation of donation funds and is a federal offense. Believe me the anger is there for a large group of athletes, parents and fans!

I feel you. This seemed rather sudden.

This looks like a troublesome situation.

My daughter (13) is really disappointed about Equestrian. We've been to a few meets.
It seemed like the program was on the rise.

I have no horse or dog in the fight but I feel as if the ICA department did a terrible injustice to the team, and their families. I see the 3rd party hire as a smoke screen for Rocko's desire to promote stunt.

I have been to 3 Equestrian events at UCD. The format of traveling and the draw of the horse is a very cool aspect of the sport. I enjoyed the entire event every time I went. UCD has great facilities and I enjoyed every minute of my day.

I feel for all the riders and the coaches to lose their sports status. The coaches will lose their job at the end of the contract and the program will take a HUGE step backward.

As for the cost, the ICA department did NOT spend large sums. The horses are donated, the families and others covered most of the expenses.

While neither stunt or equestrian are true NCAA sports but emerging I do NOT see the need to cut and promote. Doing a quick look at California schools it looks like we have CBU, SLO and UOP. So no high level school has a stunt and three programs does not mean local or regional competition.

This is Rocko's department and he is the one that should take the heat for this decision. I see it as short sighted and doing way more harm than good.

https://collegiateequestrian.com/news/2026/1/14/ncea-news-a-letter-from-executive-director-lynn-hickey.aspx

https://www.cbsnews.com/sacramento/news/uc-davis-equestrian-team/

I agree this is very disappointing for the riders and coaches affected. But is hardly the first time sports teams have been cancelled by the university. Others may have better memories than I, but some I recall go way back to the late seventies I believe.
There was the freshman football team which was very popular and successful which was culled in I believe the late seventies. Not only did it allow for the younger players to play football (who would never play for the varsity team) but it was the beginning of many Aggie coaches successful careers.
Then there was men’s wrestling.
Then there was women’s rowing
Maybe I missed some more. Polo?
All these eliminations were very hard on the players involved and very unpopular.
I find the equestrian cut hard as well because most of the women in my family are now or were once equestrian riders and horse owners.
But one further thing needs to be said about equestrian: it appeals to a very narrow demographic. Only the very wealthy can afford this sport or even horse ownership. So it raises the ethical question of whether a public university should even field a sport that only caters to the rich student?
Frankly, i cringe at the thought that a sport based on cheerleading is taking equestrians place but it is what it is. NCAA likes STUNT. NCAA doesn’t like equestrian.
Sorry for the rant.

NCAA does support Equestrian sports and spoke about this today in DC at the conference.

There was no transparency by the AD on why they made this decision which left incoming recruited athletes without options. That's a breach of contract and possible conflict of interest. So many reasons why this decision was a mistake. UCDavis is an Ag school and the #1 vet school . They should have an equestrian team where the vet school benefits from having these horses on campus. These 40+ athletes are also from very diverse backgrounds.

I'm a little cofused on the outrage. Equestrian will still be a club sport, and scholarships will be honored "throughout their undergraduate dergree completion..."

Edit - reading more, it looks like it means the program will have to be funded by the students, which probably negates the benefit of the scholarship. That is a bummer. I don't know, I get the "Aggie" aspect with horses, but always felt equestrian was a giant boondoggle for a very small minority of students.

This decision continues to get a lot of emotional, negative press:

https://www.abridged.org/news/young-athletes-face-crushed-dreams-as-uc-davis-downgrades-equestrian-team/

I also forgot to mention that men’s swimming and diving was cut a few years back. A lot of very upset people then as well. And this was a much bigger and more popular sport than equestrian.