Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, June 6, 1993 TAG: 9306060086
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C8 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Bill Brill
DATELINE: DURHAM, N.C. LENGTH: Medium
More than six years after Dooley collected his $1 million annuity and departed Virginia Tech, the school is suffering the public embarrassment of the NCAA's Graduation Rates report.
Using virtually any barometer you choose, Tech comes out looking bad during the period surveyed by the NCAA. The second report covers the freshman class of 1985-86, which was permitted six years to graduate.
The figures indicate an athletic program at Tech that, if it wasn't out of control, clearly was under nobody's observation.
If you choose not to blame Dooley the football coach, who left for Wake Forest in 1987, why not assess some responsibility to Dooley the athletic director?
Last year's initial NCAA study showed that Tech was second to Texas A&M for the worst discrepancy between the student body and athletic graduation rates for all 298 schools in Division I.
This year, the Hokies tied with Loyola Marymount for second worst, again behind Texas A&M.
The tragedy is that Tech is an excellent school that graduated 71 percent of its students in the period studied, 18 percent more than the average for Division I schools overall.
Among comparable institutions, Tech was 15 percent better than the other I-A football schools in student graduation and 17 percent better than other large public institutions.
The problem is that the athletes that were recruited during Dooley's watch didn't graduate.
The most distressing statistic is one that has gotten little attention - graduation for athletes who completed their eligibility.
In that category, Tech suffers in comparison to all of its rivals, whether in Big East Conference football, Metro Conference basketball or other sports.
Most athletic administrators at schools where rates are relatively low insist that the only reasonable comparison should be to the student body of that particular institution.
Not only does Tech suffer in that examination, but also in relation to the schools with which it competes.
The latest report shows only 46 percent of athletes who matriculated during the three-year survey from '83-85 - 67 of 146 - received their degrees.
Among the 107 I-A football schools, the only ones whose figures are worse are Houston (41 percent), Long Beach State (40) and Kansas State (35). All three of those schools have lousy overall graduation rates.
Further, among Metro schools, Tech is first in student graduation rate - only Tulane, at 69 percent, also exceeds 50 percent - but last, by a significant margin, in graduation of those who completed their eligibility.
While the Hokies graduated just 43 percent of all athletes who enrolled in '85 and 46 percent during the three years studied, the lowest number among the other Metro members was 71 percent for Southern Mississippi.
In the Big East, far stronger academically, Tech is third in student graduation behind Boston College and Rutgers but easily lowest in graduation of athletes. Pitt is next worst at 62 percent.
It's not just that Dooley's football players didn't get their degrees by 1992 - 87 percent of blacks didn't, 71 percent didn't overall - but that Tech's male athletes in general failed to graduate.
Figures for baseball, basketball, track and cross country all are low.
Meanwhile, athletes who remained in school graduated at a high rate across the state: Richmond, 100 percent; VMI, 94 percent; Virginia, 93 percent; James Madison, 88 percent; VCU, 84 percent; and Old Dominion, 76 percent.
Specifically, of 11 black student-athletes recruited at Tech in '85, one graduated. Of 42 who matriculated in three years, seven got their degrees.
If you choose not to blame Dooley the athletic director - did he pay any attention to other sports? - what about Dooley the football coach? His football players graduated at a 31 percent rate in the three years, 29 percent for '85. Among black players, the numbers were 15 percent and 13 percent, respectively.
That compared poorly with Virginia, which led all public schools in the nation with 90 percent graduation (William and Mary was second), with 81 percent of all athletes receiving degrees. The only other schools in I-A who graduated 90 percent of their students were Stanford, Notre Dame and Duke.
by CNB