What reason does KU have to start up wrestling? They have virtually no shot of ever winning anything. The sport would lose money, and lose even more money if they tried to actually be competitive. And most importantly, wrestling uses 10 scholarships, which means they would have to add 10 scholarships on the women's side, draining even more precious revenue.
Title IX has kind of forced a lot of tough decisions to be made in athletic departments. If I was AD, I would pretty much whittle my men's side down to football (85 scholarships), basketball (13 scholarships) and baseball (~12 scholarships), unless I had a big tradition in something else, such as ISU with wrestling. Then you just have to add women's sports to balance those men's scholarships, so you get basketball, softball, soccer, volleyball, etc., which all lose money for the athletic department. The more revenue losers you put on the men's side, the more you have to put on the women's side. It's the same reason why ISU isn't bringing back baseball.
It's been made quite clear over the past two weeks that to get a better place at the table of college athletics, one thing matters, and that is football. The more resources a school can devote to its football team, the better off that whole department is going to be down the line.
