What would happen if Columbia canned its athletic programs?

Absolutely cut ties with sports. Decided that 100 years of athletic misery was enough. Wham. BOOM. We weren't that good anyway, right? Why bother to keep trying?

This idea might sound ludicrous, but given the recent ruckus about the merits of student-athletes on campus, it is a scenario that some students might welcome. So, in an effort to envision what Columbia might be like without Division I athletics, I present to you an important news article, dug out of the trash bin of the future, which details just how the scenario might play out:

[Full disclosure: The following is pure fiction.]

Columbia Daily Spectator. April 6, 2017.

Exactly ten years have passed since University President Lee Bollinger shocked both the nation and the Columbia community by announcing the end of Columbia athletics.

"Athletics have no place in a University constructed to meet the challenges of the 21st century," Bollinger said on the overcast spring day. "With a heavy heart, but with a clear mind, I hereby announce the dissolution of all Columbia athletics, effective immediately."

The student reaction to the decision was characteristically mixed, with a majority of students upset by the move, but with a strong minority voicing support.

"I'm disappointed in the decision," one student said at the time. "I don't really care about the teams very much, but I enjoyed going to Homecoming. That was one of the few times it seemed like the whole University came out together. And basketball games were fun, too."

"It's about time we got rid of the jocks," another student said. "Of course, I'm not saying that all of them are dumb. But it simply was not fair that athletes got special treatment. Removing sports is a great step toward a smarter campus, and a more complete meritocracy."

The news swept across the campus like a wave. Within 12 weeks, all coaches, administrators, and staff personnel had vacated their offices. Head football coach Norries Wilson rejoined the UConn program, and head basketball coach Joe Jones (who now coaches at Villanova) accepted the Princeton job. The vacated office space in the Dodge Fitness Center was converted into offices for physics and chemistry professors.

"Surprised? Of course. That decision came out of nowhere," Jones said. "Our team was going to be special that next year, plus I really loved Columbia. It's too bad what has happened to the place since then."

The athletic director at the time, Dr. M. Dianne Murphy, tried to prevent the dissolution of the athletic programs. She built a coalition of athletic supporters and filed numerous judicial appeals-but to no avail.

The Baker Field athletic facility located at 216th Street, once the home to Columbia's football, baseball, soccer, rowing, and tennis facilities, was completely bulldozed by the end of 2008. Upon the site currently stands Columbia's new "North" campus, comprised of two dormitories and four state-of-the-art undergraduate classroom buildings, the last of which was finished this year. Construction on three additional buildings which were originally planned has not been started, due to a shortage of funds.

According to reports, Bollinger axed athletics for two key reasons. First, the expansion plans into nearby Manhattanville had stalled, leaving Columbia in need of a new target area for classroom expansion. And second, Bollinger personally decided that ridding the University of its sporting obligations was a necessary step towards creating what he called the "model University of the new century."

However, the past ten years have largely proved unkind to Columbia, and ultimately, to Bollinger's decision.

During the first few years, the changes in the student body noticed by students were largely peripheral, certainly much less revolutionary than administrators had expected.

"The freshman class looks a lot, well, smaller," one upperclassman remarked during the first year without athletics. "And there are definitely fewer people wearing sweatpants around the campus, I think."

"I really haven't seen the 'enhanced intellectual quality' or whatever Bollinger was talking about," another student said. "Lectures are still half-filled. I have a little brother who's a first-year, and he says most of the kids in Lit Hum are still idiots."

"School spirit" on campus, never strong to begin with, nearly died out alongside the athletic programs. University mainstays such as the Varsity Show have continued to thrive on campus, of course, but the loss of athletics helped further the University's reputation as a "commuter school" and one that was "devoid of any source of community," according to Columbia historians.

Without sports, according to one student, Columbia became "just another NYU, only in a shittier location."

Columbia was ousted from the Ivy League-which, by its charter, is an athletic conference-and replaced by Georgetown in 2008.

The loss of the "Ivy" moniker soon manifested itself in Columbia admissions. Admission rates to the school peaked at a low of 8.9 percent for the class which was admitted in 2007, but rose sharply to 17 percent by 2009.

In a similar fashion to the way in which the University of Chicago's admission rates jumped to nearly 50 percent when it removed athletics, Columbia's admission rates steadily increased during the ensuing years, ballooning to 46.9 percent for the most recent class, the class of 2021.

Alumni contributions declined sharply after the dissolution of athletics, partly because the University lacked the social sporting events to lure alumni back to campus, and partly because a large core of alumni donors-former athletes-felt betrayed.

As admission rates rose and alumni donations stalled, the University found itself in a financial bind: unable to fully complete its proposed "North campus" and lacking the financial resources to match the extensive financial aid reforms of peer institutions [Harvard, indeed, announced the end of undergraduate tuition costs three years ago. Admission rates have since fallen to 3 percent.].

"I guess we never fully considered to what extent the positive externalities that emanated from athletics helped foster a better social and educational environment at Columbia," one senior administrator said, speaking on the condition of anonymity.

"If we had it to do all over again, I am sure we would have not made the same decision. Athletics-and by extension, the athletes that make up the teams-have an integral role to play in any American university that aspires to create a rich and diverse undergraduate experience."

"That's a realization that we at Columbia, unfortunately, had to learn the hard way."