As far as college athletics goes, Title IX applies to the proportional number of male/female athletes IN THE AGGREGATE with no regard to individual teams or their likenesses to each other. As such, hypothetically if the math worked out correctly, you could eliminate men’s basketball and men’s soccer with the women’s offset being lacrosse if the two men’s teams combined to be just about (or slightly greater than) the same number of athletes as women’s lacrosse. As a university with slightly more men than women, I believe that the proportion of target athletes is to match that m/f ratio rather than being held to a 50/50 standard. Basketball for basketball, soccer for soccer, and even baseball for softball are common add (or drop) pairings, but there is no requirement to match with “like” sports. I sincerely hope that it never comes down to dropping any sport programs, as they all add to the overall student experience. I would love to see more students in the softball stands. In this era of big money sports paying out a growing percentage of total athletic dollars, non-revenue sports that don’t touch the student body in meaningful ways become ripe for any reduction discussions regardless of the program success or community support.