Few universities can claim to have shaped the global sporting landscape as profoundly as McGill has. Among its crowning sports achievements are the first game of organized ice hockey in 1875, the first game of American football in 1874, and the invention of basketball by McGill alum James Naismith in 1891. Since its inception in 1923, the McGill Athletics Department has overseen the coordination of various sports such as volleyball and rugby.
These milestones, however, are overshadowed by a longstanding issue. In the 1860s, the university introduced pay-as-you-go sports clubs, where participants were responsible for paying the fees associated with the sport they played. More than a century later, this system persists as athletes are forced to shoulder the costs of competition.
For as long as McGill has had intercollegiate competition sports teams, it has struggled to fund them. In 1970, McGill was running a deficit of $6 million CAD and threatened to cut sports altogether. However, community outrage led to an agreement between McGill University and the McGill Athletics Department to increase athletic fees so that intercollegiate sports at the school could continue.
A turning point in McGill Athletics’ Varsity Program came in 1997 when, once again, McGill found itself facing dire budget constraints. At the time, McGill Athletics had a whopping 48 varsity teams and was pressured by the university to establish budgetary measures. These included dropping 22 teams—resulting in the 26-team varsity program we know today—and designating varsity teams into ‘Tier 1’ and ‘Tier 2’ categories. Using this framework allowed the university to manage resources and provide more funds, equipment, and media representation to the higher-tiered teams—a system still in place 28 years later.
This “new age” of sports is reminiscent of the first years of sports at McGill from a financial perspective. However, this now-not-so-new system comes with several negative consequences, one of the most significant being that the success of a team and the amount of funding and resources they receive are inextricably linked. This undeniably inhibits the growth of some teams in favour of others. Which begs the question: Is it time for the tiered system to be reevaluated?
As a journalist, unbiased conveyance of the truth is my top priority. However, as a varsity athlete who is a part of one of the most underfunded teams at McGill, it is impossible to write this article without bias. Being a student-athlete at McGill University has shaped both my university experience and who I am as a person. I am eternally grateful for the privilege of playing a sport I love at the collegiate level. However, I am disheartened by the inequality that plagues the Varsity Program.
Today, McGill Athletics oversees 26 varsity teams, 10 competitive clubs, and 3 recreational clubs. Of these 26 varsity teams, 10 teams—five women’s and five men’s—have secured the coveted ‘Tier 1’ label. They are the following: Basketball (W&M), Football (M), Hockey (W&M), Soccer (W&M), Swimming (W/M), and Volleyball (W). This leaves 16 teams to fill ‘Tier 2’: Badminton (W/M), Baseball (M), Field Hockey (W), Golf (W/M), Lacrosse (M), Rowing (W/M), Rugby (W&M), Artistic Swimming (W), Track & Field (W/M), and Cross Country (W/M). There is no public information explaining how sports are assigned to Tier 1 or Tier 2, but we can guess that the most popular are chosen to be Tier 1, while less popular sports are pushed into the shadows.
McGill Athletics has a difficult job. In a written statement, Stephanie Malley, McGill Athletics’ Senior Communications and Marketing Manager, stated that the organization oversees more than two dozen teams. Many of these teams do not compete or train at the McGill Sports Complex and compete in a variety of leagues, all of which have their own rules and regulations.
“What is really important to consider […] especially when it comes to funding, is that even though McGill Athletics and Recreation is a self-funded unit, we still face the same financial challenges as the rest of the University. This has meant identifying where monies can be saved and implementing austerity measures when needed,” Malley wrote to The Tribune. “The resources needed to properly support a team of, for example, 100 student-athletes versus a team of 20 student-athletes will always be different.”
But can McGill Athletics expect the under-funded teams to grow and perform at the same level as teams that have double or triple the number of resources? And is a two-tier system really the best at fostering a supportive and thriving Varsity Program?
At a minimum, a team must have the resources to scout and recruit talented rookies, stay healthy throughout the year, have a competent coaching staff, and have adequate equipment to be successful in collegiate-level athletics. To check all these boxes, a team must have sufficient funding and resources. If one of these elements is not up to standard, the whole system falls apart.
A source on the Tier-1 Redbirds soccer team who wished to remain anonymous disclosed that their team fees average around $180 CAD per year for veteran players and $250 CAD for rookie players. Compare this to the Tier-2 Martlets field hockey team, who pay more than $1,000 CAD per player per year. Though team fees are not publicly posted, nor is there any transparency from McGill Athletics about which teams they fund and which they do not, we can expect this same trend to be true for a majority, if not all, of Tier-1 and Tier-2 teams. Beyond the monetary support, men's soccer, a team of 31 players, has four coaches, one head physician, one athletic therapist, and four student physiotherapists, while field hockey, a team of 22 players, has two coaches, no physicians, no athletic therapists, and no physiotherapists. There is a difference between efficient resource allocation and disregard for athlete safety.
Beyond essential resources like physiotherapists and equipment, representation in the media is a powerful tool that can greatly impact the success of a team. Frequent and higher quality media representation means more support from fans and alumni—whether monetary or other—along with more effective outreach for recruitment opportunities. Teams that get more attention tend to attract better players, which leads to greater success and, in turn, more attention. Even via Instagram posts, this difference in treatment between Tier 1 and Tier 2 is evident. McGill Athletics advertises its teams mainly through its Instagram, @mcgillathletics, and news articles on its home page.
By conducting an analysis of McGill Athletics’ Instagram posts throughout the past year (Aug. 23, 2024–Aug. 23, 2025), some key discrepancies arise. Across 312 posts, teams were featured a total of 353 times, as some posts highlighted more than one team. 242 of these features, equaling almost 70 per cent, promoted the 10 Tier-1 teams. Of these features, Redbirds Football and Redbirds Hockey accounted for 15 per cent each, leaving the remaining 40 per cent to be split among the remaining eight Tier-1 teams.
A plausible explanation for the differences in media representation among teams of the same tier is program success. It could be assumed that teams that are most successful get more media representation because they have ‘earned it.’ However, this is not the case. Redbirds Football had a record of 3–6 in the 2024–2025 season, while Redbirds Soccer had a 10–7–4 record. Despite this, Redbirds Football was posted 35 times, while Redbirds Soccer was posted only 22 times. Why? When I contacted the media representative who runs the Instagram, I was redirected to Stephanie Malley, who provided no answers.
There are similar discrepancies on the Tier-2 side. Redbirds Rugby and Redbirds Lacrosse secured 20 Instagram posts each, while the next most-posted team, Track & Field, had only 12 features. All three of these teams were fairly successful last season, with records of 6–3 and 11–2, respectively, for rugby and lacrosse, and 2nd (M) and 3rd (W) place finishes in the RSEQ Finals for Track & Field. It is not a question of why these three teams were highlighted. However, the inconsistency is visible with respect to McGill’s Artistic Swim Team, which, despite being second in the nation, had a mere four features on Instagram in the past year.
In a written statement to The Tribune, Artistic Swim Team member Reagan Burgmann, U1 Psychology, shared her frustrations with the lack of support from McGill Athletics.
“We receive absolutely no funding from the school and have to fundraise to pay for equipment, clothing, competition wear, and travel […] We receive little-to-no recognition for our consistent high placement at national competitions,” Burgmann wrote. “We are never delegated to other athletic teams to come help volunteer at our events or support us in the crowd, despite the fact that we are consistently asked to do so for others.”
She added, “It’s not shocking that a small, niche, female-dominated sport often goes unacknowledged by the athletics committee, but I feel that’s all the more reason to be supporting our team–especially considering our strong reputation within the community.”
This is not a unique experience nor a unique feeling among varsity athletes. The Redbirds Soccer source also shared what he thinks regarding McGill Athletics’ lack of transparency in a written statement to The Tribune.
“One area where […] McGill Athletics really needs to improve is its clarity and transparency around the support and financial funding it provides to different teams […] What really highlights the lack of transparency is that there's no available information about which sports are in which tiers and why they are there.”
He continued: “[McGill Athletics] must take accountability and be transparent about their decision-making to teams and student-athletes. Otherwise, this lack of transparency only reinforces the idea that McGill doesn't reward success and is more a game of favorites, ultimately leading student-athletes at McGill to the understandable impression that McGill Athletics is one of the most poorly run university athletic programs in Canada due to a lack of funding, organization, transparency, or a combination of all three.”
If McGill’s own varsity athletes feel they cannot trust their management, a great divide is created, not just between Tier-1 and Tier-2 athletes, but between student-athletes and McGill Athletics themselves. This divide will only continue to foster an environment where players must worry more about how they will afford to pay for their next season than about how to win their next match. The lack of equal media representation will further leave athletes in lower-tier sports questioning why they should even try to improve if they will never get the funding or recognition they deserve.
McGill Athletics must be transparent in their resource allocation and adjust their expectations to reflect the simple and unfortunate truth that funding most often equals success. They must take accountability for their tiered system, which guarantees inequality between teams and will only ever stunt the growth of the program. They must give athletes from every sport a voice in the management process. And they must start giving credit where credit is due if they want their Martlets and Redbirds to feel proud wearing a varsity M.
