Title IX at 50: How girls sports changed through the years

A large population of women have grown up with opportunities to compete in sports. Others, however, haven't had the same luck. Moms, aunts, cousins and grandmas faced struggles of not being given rights because of their gender. Up until 1972, women were discriminated against; but this changed for good when Sen. Birch Bayh pushed for and President Nixon signed Title IX into law, preventing discrimination based on sex, giving women the right to participate in sports at the high school and collegiate levels.

Women entering high school after 1972 have always had the right to participate in sports sanctioned by the Nebraska School Activities Association, but women before did not have the same opportunities and had to adapt.

Janice (Trease) Bolling began her Clearwater high school career in 1964. In her four high school years, she was an active athlete in volleyball and track, competing every season until her graduation in 1968. According to Bolling, volleyball was played in three games and whoever won two was given the first-place award. Each game was only played to 15 points, so games were over much quicker than the modern version, which features the best three of five sets, with the first to 25 points the victor.

Games were played on Friday nights, with plenty of time for the young women to go to Cardinal football games, which followed later that evening. Practice was the last period of the school day, much like junior high practices are today.

Bolling said she "loved getting to play with her TeamMates, even if there was no state championship at this time."

In addition to volleyball, Bolling competed in girls' track during the spring. Once again, at this time there were no state championships for women, so the Cardinal team competed throughout the spring at various meets.

Janet Wolfe is a few years younger than Bolling and she, too, missed the passing of Title IX by a short few years. Her class also played volleyball while the boys practiced for football and had free time during the boys' basketball season. In the spring, the school had a girls' track team.

As Bolling was a 1968 grad and Wolfe, a 1970 grad, they weren't in high school when the first sanctioned girls' track team was formed and also weren't there for the takeoff of girls' basketball.

The two women did play a short version of the game we know today, where play took place half court. A few practices were held, but there was no official team or games played at this time.

On June 23, 1972, Title IX was passed, giving women the right to partake in school-sanctioned sports. Clearwater High School took action when this passed and had a volleyball team and track team, but didn't have basketball until one brave woman took a stand.

DeeAnn (McKillip) Sanne challenged the traditional role of being a freshman. Instead of being quiet and observing what high school was like, she broke through the crowd and petitioned for a girls' basketball team. She and a group of friends, went to the school board in fall 1976 and requested the school board start a team. At this time, her grandfather was serving on the school board, and no doubt, helped this momentous proposition to pass. Only 10 girls competed on the newly-formed team. However, this wasn't necessarily a bad thing ... they all made varsity and didn't have to try out.

The first season of basketball started during the winter of 1976, the first season of girls' roundball at the school in 30 years.

Rod Havel coached these women and had Paul Horman as his assistant coach.

Only five games were scheduled. None of the players were seniors, which left plenty of rebuilding time for the whole team.

Horman took over the head coach position for the 1977 - 1978 and the 1978 - 1979 seasons. This team took the skills they learned and won the first Sandhills Gateway girls' basketball tournament.

Larry Pease took over and directed the women for two years, and even coached them the Class D state championship in 1981.

The coaching position was then taken over by Jeff Walz, who helped the team win the Class D state runner-up trophy in 1982.

Years later, the Lady Cardinals won Class D2 runner-up in 2005, showing the strength of their team even more.

After Title IX's passage in 1972, Clearwater had an official girls' track team. Betty (Behnk) Palu was among many of the young girls on the 1974 track team. She competed all four years of her high-school career, with only two of those years being NSAA sanctioned.

During her track career, she competed in the 100-yard run, 220-yard run, 440 and 880 relays. Meets were held once a week and were co-ed.

Palu stated she had so much fun competing and she had "great coaches." The team supported one another and Palu never felt pressured to do more than she was supposed to.

In 1976, Marcia (Walton) Thurlow made history by bagging an NSAA girls' district track championship in shot put for Clearwater High School. She continued her winning streak by qualifying for state in 1977, 1978 and 1979, but did not attend senior year, as she was sick. Although she did not place at the state meets, Thurlow stated, "It was an experience of a lifetime just getting to go."

Flash forward 50 years and women's sports are stronger than ever.

The Lady Cardinals volleyball team achieved many successes, including multiple rides to state championships in 1980, 1981, 1985, 1998, 2000, 2001 and 2004.

Over a decade later, the Lady Bobcats punched their first ticket to state in 2019, the first year they were officially the Summerland Bobcats.

The Lady Cards basketball team achieved greatness by winning the Class D champion title in 1981, runner-up in 1982, Class D2 state qualifier in 2002 and 2004 and a Class D2 runner-up trophy in 2005.

Multiple women athletes have been state track qualifiers for the Lady Cards from 1976 up until today. This includes teams from 1976 to 1979, 1984, 1987, 1992, 1999 and 2001 to 2009.

The Lady Cyclones had qualifications in 2010 to 2014, 2017 and 2018.

In 2022, the Lady Bobcats earned their first ticket to state as well, with Hadley Cheatum earning three medals.

The NSAA does not have a detailed record of qualifiers in the early 70s and 80s, so there may not be qualifying years listed above, since these were the records that were available.