With the June 30 deadline quickly approaching for eight athletic teams to raise funds necessary to sustain their teams, seven teams appear unlikely to see another season as Terps.

Although the men’s outdoor track and field team has renewed hope now that the athletics department granted it an extension in raising the money needed to fund the program, the other seven teams on the chopping block – men’s and women’s swimming and diving, women’s water polo, men’s tennis, men’s cross country, men’s indoor track and acrobatics and tumbling – still remain millions of dollars removed from their goals.

“I think they’re in a more difficult spot of gathering resources that are needed to really put together a campaign to raise the money that’s needed to save their sports,” Athletic Director Kevin Anderson said.

Rather than requiring men’s outdoor track to raise the combined $9.5 million needed to fund both its program and acrobatics and tumbling, athletics officials instead provided the team with a set of benchmarks to meet over the next 20 months. The team has already surpassed its first benchmark – $470,000 by April 2 – by raising $573,784 as of yesterday. The team must now raise $940,000 by June 30 and $3.76 million by December 2013, in order to ensure it remains a team at this university.

“Having the opportunity to reach out and have the potential of saving another sport is why we are going through this in the first place, so I’m confident the track community is rallying behind this,” Anderson said. “I’m enthusiastic about where we are in the momentum we continue to gather for trying to save all the teams. … That is still my expectation.”

Even though the athletics department also granted men’s and women’s swimming and diving benchmark goals last month, the team is still more than $1 million short of meeting its first April 1 deadline of $1.4 million. So far, the team has raised $68,631, and, as of Friday, the Save Maryland Swimming and Diving Foundation is reporting $430,000 in commitments and verbal pledges after a $19,000 donation, according to Senior Associate Athletic Director Cheryl Harrison.

And although the M Club, an organization comprised of former varsity athletes, committed $1 million to the “Save the Programs Campaign,” it has not yet decided which teams will receive the money.

While swim team members do not know whether they will compete next season, team member Haley Bull said for now, swimmers are gearing their efforts toward competing.

“I think we’re just trying to focus on our swimming and stay positive about everything,” Bull said.

Men’s tennis, which has raised $1,385, is also working toward gaining new deadlines, Harrison said. However, women’s water polo and acrobatics and tumbling – which have raised $18,721 and $5,221, respectively – have not discussed benchmarking with the athletics department.

While men’s outdoor track’s prospects of being saved are much more likely with the new deadlines, team members are still largely unhappy with the compromise since athletes cannot save men’s cross country and men’s indoor track as well.

Because most team members compete for all three sports throughout the year, some have already made plans to transfer and others are exploring alternative options.

Several athletes, such as junior distance runner Craig Morgan, said eliminating two of the three sports and cutting the roster from 28 men to 14 is not realistic.

“It looks good on paper, like we’re going to show up to ACCs with 14 athletes and they’re going to be 14 superstars,” Morgan said. “But it just doesn’t work like that. At any given time about a third of the team is injured.”

Several students said they are considering leaving the team now that they can only compete in outdoor track, assuming they are not first cut from the roster. All-American jumper Dwight Barbiasz has already transferred to the University of Florida.

Sophomore distance runner Kyle Graves said he made the difficult decision to transfer to Wake Forest University in the fall.

“Being a three-sport athlete, I couldn’t even imagine only competing for one season,” Graves said. “It would be such a dramatic change. I don’t really think I could adjust to that and perform as well as I could.”

lurye@umdbk.com