I think I may have said this last year when we were killing the
between-season time, but since we're into another round of pointing out
how crazy many NC$$ rules seem to be, let me try putting a slightly
different spin on things.
Despite the coaches' and athletic directors' outcries, I believe the
involvement of the presidents in the NC$$ a *potentially* good thing.
Nearly all these rules which we're decrying were put in by athletic
representatives. Why? Because of the almost irrational obsession with
guaranteeing "competitive" arrangements. Most of these things are rules
designed to keep schools from outcompeting one another when it comes to
attracting athletes to their programs, and/or keeping them in the
programs.
The president's group (although not doing nearly as much as it should
and seemed to promise it would) at least has looked at the kinds of
things you would think a "collegeiate athletic association" would be
concerned about. Like, how much time does commitment to a program take
out of a student-athlete's study opportunities? How much academic
progress does a student-athlete make--do we care if they're being just
used as PR pieces for the institution, or are we interested in their
getting an education? And--and here I know a lot on Hockey-L will
disagree--how do you keep athletics from drawing so much funding away
from other programs that they're actually hurt? That's the idea behind
the limits on number of scholarships which can be given, the number of
assitant coaches who can be hired, etc. Sure, it makes the programs
slightly less "competitive" (read "professional") each time you do that;
but it also lessens the financial impact on other programs that
athletics can have. In fairness, I recognize that to some extent *some*
of the latter kinds of regulation were also favored by ADs and coaches
at less well off institutions trying to put the brakes on their more
financially-blessed brethern, purely for reasons of competition again.
Well, my main point isn't to hassle about the relative value of
athletics as a financial investment by colleges, but rather that most of
the silly rules are things which people concerned about academics find
ridiculous themselves. We SHOULD help students, athletes and
nonathletes alike, when they have a financial need or some other
support. Good grief, my previous institution had to fire its basketball
coach when it discovered he had paid--from his own salary--the cost of a
bus ticket for one of his players to travel home to attend his father's
funeral! To any of us on the academic side, the coach's behavior was
laudable; but, of course it violated NCAA rules, and to keep from
getting into big trouble he had to be let go. Sheesh!
Put another way--I think over 90% of the NC$$'s activity is directed
toward things which are quite unimportant, while much that IS important
is not attended to at all.
**********************************************************************
* Steve Christopher, NMU [log in to unmask] - GO CATS! * * * * *
* NCAA Division I Hockey National Champions 1990-91 * "WE'VE * *
* NCAA Division I Hockey Final Eight 1991-92 * ONLY * *
* NCAA Division I Hockey Final Eight 1992-93 * JUST * *
* WCHA League Champions 1990-91 * BEGUN"* *
* WCHA Playoff Champions 1988-89/1990-91/1991-92 * * * * *
**********************************************************************
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