Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, January 24, 1993 TAG: 9301240022
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C12 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: BILL BRILL
DATELINE: DURHAM, N.C. LENGTH: Medium
CHANGES WON'T END THE WORLD
The NCAA: Back to the Future, Part II:As I left Dallas a week ago after attending the NCAA convention, I was going to write a column about what I thought would be happening if I projected myself to the year 2000.
What would college sports be like then? I asked a lot of people. I got a lot of different answers.
To the presidents who follow the line, now a cliche, "Chicago dropped football and that didn't hurt them at all," I award the "Can't See the Forest for the Trees" lapel button.
That was a different time, folks - more than two generations ago, before football really was football. For those of you who were not aware, the University of Chicago was a big deal in football in the 1930s, dropped the sport because of financial problems and presumably never regretted it a moment.
If you think they can drop football at Clemson or Alabama or NBC, I mean Notre Dame, you've got another thing coming, baby.
OK. Nobody says football will be dropped. Perish the thought, even though it costs all the little guys who play it a bundle. Even the biggest of the big, 106,000-seat-stadium Michigan, is awash in red ink.
But somewhere between paranoia (the coaches and athletic directors who want no more cuts at Division I-A level) and absurdity (a return to the one-platoon days) rests reality.
I have spoken with reality. His/her (gender equity) answer is, "Football can survive additional modest reductions in squad and staff size without mortally wounding the patient."
For those among you who have not flunked math - remember now, if you're getting out of high school in '96, you must have taken, and passed, algebra and geometry to be eligible for a scholarship - I appreciate that 13 and 15 are not equal.
They happen to be the number of scholarships that men and women, in that order, can offer in basketball, beginning next school year.
That is the NCAA's (read: presidents) peculiar way of saying, "We know we haven't been in compliance with Title IX, and this is our way of caring." Of course, Title IX doesn't say that you have to have such a ludicrous situation, but not everybody (read: presidents) understands that.
Let me stop myself right here and slap myself on the cheek, as Rush Limbaugh would do. It appears that I am taking some cheap shots at college presidents, and I don't do that.
Slap, slap. That's better.
I support what the presidents want. Always have. It's just that this whole college sports thing has become such an emotional issue that we're barreling along at breakneck speed while giving the appearance of getting nowhere.
Sooner or later - I hope way before 2000 - people will come to their senses.
What must be acknowledged by all before we have a Gunfight at the NCAA Corral is that there are varying degrees of needs and capabilities in the college sports business.
The Big Guys must be given their freedom to administer to their own necessities, but the Little Guys not only outnumber them, but distrust them.
If you think the Little Guys team to support legislation that enhances their circumstance, leave for recess. You know enough.
Gene Corrigan, the ACC commissioner, has his thoughts on the matter. "What we need are rules for football and basketball," he said, "and then everybody else do whatever they want."
This is a remarkably accurate statement. Hey, if some school wants to give 30 scholarships in fencing, let 'em.
The best thing that has occurred in the past decade in college sports is the resurrection of the phrase, student-athlete. At most places, it no longer is an oxymoron. With far stiffer eligibility and satisfactory progress requirements either in place or on the horizon, Junior will no longer take Basket Weaving 101.
The best thing has been the success of the NCAA men's basketball tournament. With its 64-team field, March Madness has become a jewel that mesmerizes the sporting section of our nation for a month.
The worst thing is it has created an unworkable grouping of 298 schools, most seeking fortune rather than fame, that have little in common.
A prediction: Big-time football will survive, but with a reasonable trim (no scalping). Big-time basketball (a handful of schools beyond football) will have its own set of rules, which will not necessarily be the same as small-time schools. But they all will remain in the tournament, and March will be as Mad as ever.