College Basketball

COLLEGE BASKETBALL

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, the second issue I would like to address is an issue that could not be more timely. The issue is "March Madness." Frankly, everywhere I have gone today-in the airport, while traveling, as I came back to my office-everybody is abuzz about the basketball games over the weekend.

I am happy the University of Illinois is going into Sweet 16. There have been upsets and great victories, and those who love college basketball cannot wait each year for the NCAA tournament. It is college basketball really brought home to America in a way like no other sport. Sixty-five teams start, and in the end one will be champion.

But, frankly, when we take a closer look and understand the reality of who the players are, it calls into question whether or not in many cases this is college basketball.

Let me tell you what I mean.

Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the RECORD today's lead editorial in the Chicago Tribune of March 22.

There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in the RECORD, as follows:

[From the Chicago Tribune]
THE REAL MARCH MADNESS

If you're a basketball fan, you know how many college teams qualify each year for the NCAA men's tournament: 65. But can you guess how many schools would be playing if there was a requirement that they had to graduate at least half of their athletes?

If you guessed a third, you'd be about right.

Commentary about college sports often focuses on programs with serious shortcomings. So let it be noted that there are some universities that have exemplary records combining athletics and scholarships. Among the schools with teams in this year's tournament, Kansas graduates 73 percent of its players within six years of their original enrollment. At Dayton, 82 percent get a degree, and at Lehigh, the figure is 90 percent. Atop them all is Stanford, with a 100 percent graduation rate (and a number one seed in the tourney).

Three years ago, the Knight Foundation Commission on Intercollegiate Athletics proposed that postseason competition be limited to teams that graduate at least 50 percent of their players. But the NCAA obviously has a long way to go. Of the 65 teams playing this year, only 21 would qualify under that rule-down from 22 last year.

For that matter, 10 of the teams fail to graduate even 20 percent of their players. But they're not the worst. Commission Chairman William C. Friday, president emeritus of the University of North Carolina, noted that "four of the teams in the men's tournament failed to graduate a single athlete over the period we reviewed." He was kind enough not to identify them.

Basketball fans may be aghast to think what March Madness would look like if the commission had its way. Only three of this year's first-round games could be played if its rule were in effect-Gonzaga v. Valparaiso, North Carolina vs. Air Force, and Mississippi State vs. Monmouth. A tournament like that would make for a short, craze-free March.

But if the rule were in effect, you can be sure schools would be taking the steps needed to strengthen their academic mission. They'd recruit kids capable of doing college-level work, and they'd structure their programs to assure that players devote as much time and energy to their studies as to their sport. If every school that hoped to play in the tournament had to graduate 50 percent of its players, just about every school would graduate 50 percent of its players.

That's as it should be. Most college basketball players will never play professionally. They need an education that prepares them for life after sports.

The Knight Foundation Commission goal is hardly outlandish, as the teams in the women's tournament regularly demonstrate. Of the 63 women's teams for which the commission had sufficient data to judge, only 10 failed to graduate half their players.
And there's no apparent conflict between success in the classroom and success on the court: At many of the perennial powers, such as Connecticut, Tennessee, Texas and Duke, upwards of 67 percent of players get degrees.

On the men's side, though, most schools apparently care more about winning than anything else. That approach creates far too many losers.

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, this editorial raises the following question:

[C]an you guess how many schools would be playing [in the NCAA men's tournament] if there was a requirement that they had to graduate at least half of their athletes [in a 6-year period of time]?

If you guessed a third, you'd be right.

This article goes on to note that some universities involved in this tournament have exemplary records combining athletics and scholarship; and he names Kansas, with 73 percent of its players graduating within 6 years of their original enrollment; Dayton, 82 percent; Lehigh, 90 percent; and atop the chart-which is a university which lost yesterday-Stanford, with 100 percent.

This editorial says:
Three years ago, the Knight Foundation Commission on Intercollegiate Athletics proposed that postseason competition be limited to teams that graduate at least 50 percent of their players [within 6 years]. But the NCAA obviously has a long way to go. Of the 65 teams playing [in the tournament] this year, only 21 would qualify under that rule-down from 22 last year.

For that matter, 10 of the teams [in the NCAA tournament] fail to graduate even 20 percent of their players.

This is what commission Chairman William Friday, president emeritus of the University of North Carolina, noted:

[F]our of the teams in the men's tournament failed to graduate a single athlete over the period we reviewed.

The information here talks about the general graduation rate. We call this college basketball. But if we were to learn that there was a team headed for the Sweet Sixteen or the Final Four that did not have a single college player graduate, we would cry fraud. This is supposed to be about college athletes participating against one another. But if you have schools involved in the tournament where none-absolutely none-of the athletes involved in the basketball game are ever going to graduate, are these truly college students, is this really college basketball?
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Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the RECORD a commentary from that same newspaper written by Derrick Z. Jackson, entitled "Suppressing the bad news on NCAA graduation rates."

There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in the RECORD, as follows:

SUPPRESSING THE BAD NEWS ON NCAA GRADUATION RATES
(By Derrick Z. Jackson)

Not to be outdone by the federal government's attempts to delete key portions of reports on global warming, health disparities, and racism within the Justice Department, here comes the National Collegiate Athletic Association. That august body is eliminating the graduation rates of basketball players. What is good for the Bush administration is wonderful news for the Universities of Cincinnati, Kentucky, Louisville and Memphis.

March Madness ought to be canceled with the scandal that is in the computer banks of the NCAA's 2003 Graduation Rates Report. The report covers whether scholarship athletes who entered school in the falls of 1993, 1994, 1995 or 1996 graduated within six years. The report is the best long-term way to see whether a university is providing an education to its athletes or pimping them in an era where CBS is paying the NCAA $6 billion over 11 years to televise men's games and where an additional $3.5 billion will be wagered illegally on this year's tournament alone, according to The Wall Street Journal. The amount of betting is half the annual budget of the chronically underfunded Head Start.

That is March Madness enough, but now the NCAA has quietly adjusted the graduation rates to satisfy "a new interpretation" of federal laws which say that information on any category containing only one or two students "must be suppressed."

In basketball, which has far fewer players than football or baseball teams, the new rules amount to liberation from any accountability whatsoever on the part of college athletic departments and their presidents.

Because of the new rules, 37 of the 65 men's teams in this year's tournament did not publish graduation rates of their African-American players. Sixteen schools published no graduation rates at all.

Nine of the 16 schools that mysteriously had no graduation rate whatsoever just happen to include last year's most hideous offenders, such as:

Alabama (0 percent for black men and 13 percent overall in the 2002 report).
Cincinnati (0 percent for black men, 17 percent overall).
Louisville (0 for black men, 10 percent overall).
Kentucky (13 percent and 33 percent overall).
Southern Illinois (14 percent for black men and 27 percent overall).
Memphis (0 period).
Nevada (0 percent for black men, 20 percent overall).
Virginia Commonwealth (0 period).
Alabama State (0 period).

The "new rules" did not stop the schools with good and great graduation rates from publishing them, even when the numbers of players on scholarship are obviously similar to the schools that withheld the information. Kansas, Air Force, Manhattan, Gonzaga, Vanderbilt, Central Florida, Duke, Princeton, Valparaiso, Stanford, Monmouth and Xavier all had African-American player graduation rates of at least 67 percent.

Among New England schools in the men's and women's tournament, the Connecticut men's team published its general and woeful graduation rate of 27 percent, but withheld its black rate. The UConn women's team published its general graduation rate of 67 percent but withheld the black rate. Boston College's men's team published both its 46 percent overall and 67 percent African-American rate. BC's women's team published its 71 percent overall rate but withheld its black rate.

Rates for Providence's men were 42 percent overall, 50 percent for black men, Vermont's men were 55 percent overall and the school withheld a figure for black men. Maine's women were at 69 percent overall, with no black women to count.

In the case of most of the New England schools, the withholding of the black rate actually did not affect the overall rate much as the white rate was similar to the overall rate. But it was very clear that many other schools purposely hid disastrous rates. For instance, Georgia Tech did not publish the rate of its black athletes. But with a white graduation rate of 60 percent, it managed to plummet to an overall rate of 27 percent. Texas Tech did not publish the rates for black athletes. But with a white graduation rate of 60 percent, it had an overall rate of only 33 percent.

Last year, 13 men's schools had a 0 graduation rate for black men. The average black male graduation rate for the 65-team field was 35 percent. With the liberation provided by the new privacy rules, only one university in this year's field published a black male rate under 38 percent. That was Eastern Washington, where the rate was zero.

That is probably because that school is not a perennial NCAA powerhouse. Give it time. A couple more appearances in March Madness and school officials will join Kentucky, Cincinnati, and Louisville in erasing its records, too. If President Bush wins re-election and needs some more bureaucrats to delete the truth, he knows where he can find them. At the NCAA and in our nation's athletic departments.

Mr. DURBIN. Mr. Jackson comes at this issue a little differently. Mr. Jackson says, let's take a close look and see how many are graduating who are minorities, African Americans. He says:

This is March Madness . . . but now NCAA has quietly adjusted the graduation rates to satisfy "a new interpretation" of federal laws which say that information on any category containing only one or two students "must be suppressed."

What it basically means is that these schools will not publish the graduation rates of their athletes, and particularly will not publish the graduation rates of the African-American athletes who are playing basketball.

Because of the new rules [as interpreted by the NCAA], 37 of the 65 men's teams in this year's tournament did not publish graduation rates of their African-American players. Sixteen schools published no graduation rates at all.

Nine of the 16 schools that mysteriously had no graduation rate whatsoever just happen to include last year's most hideous offenders. . . .

He lists the following universities: Alabama University, zero-percent graduation rate for Black players, and 13 percent overall-this is in a 2002 report-Cincinnati, zero percent for African-American athletes, 17 percent overall; Louisville, zero percent for Black men, 10 percent overall; Kentucky, 13 percent for African Americans, 33 percent overall; Southern Illinois, 14 percent for Black men, 27 percent overall; Memphis, zero percent in both groups, Black and White basketball players not graduating; Nevada, zero percent for Black men, 20 percent overall; Virginia Commonwealth, zero percent in both categories; Alabama State, zero percent, period.

He goes on to list the schools that can point with pride to their graduation rates. Kansas, Air Force, Manhattan, Gonzaga, Vanderbilt, Central Florida, Duke, Princeton, Valparaiso, Stanford, Monmouth, and Xavier all had African-American player graduation rates of at least 67 percent.

Among New England schools in the men's and women's tournament, the Connecticut men's team published its general and woeful graduation rate of 27 percent, but withheld [the graduation rate for African Americans].

Rates for Providence's men were 42 percent overall; 50 percent for Black men. Vermont's men were 55 percent on their men's basketball team overall, and they withheld the figure for their African-American athletes.

Mr. President, the reason I think these two items should be in the RECORD is that all of us enjoy watching college basketball.

But, frankly, if these athletes we are watching are not really college students, we are not watching the best of college basketball; we are watching the best of colleges and universities that are sending teams of so-called students who have not even a ghost of a chance of ever graduating from their institution.

These men in the men's tournament are being used. They are being used as players on the court in the hope that some of them will end up in professional basketball. I am sure that is their ambition, but such a small percentage ever do.

So we watch and applaud and talk about our alma maters and their devotion to education when, in fact, these schools know full well that the people who are being put on the court to play this game are, frankly, never going to graduate in most instances in many of these schools.

What do the universities get out of it? A lot of money. They go to the NCAA tournament, and the money comes back to them in revenue, money that might have been spent to help some of their players get the help they need to go on to graduate. But, sadly, that never happens.

Mr. President, I am going to be looking at this interpretation of the NCAA rule which allows them to suppress and, frankly, refuse to publish the graduation rate of African-American players who are at the NCAA tournament, and, frankly, in all other sports. I think that should be public knowledge. I think the leaders at the universities have an obligation to not only put the best basketball teams on the court but to make certain those teams are made up of real students who, with the help of the university, are going to end up graduating someday and have a college education on which to build their lives.
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Unfortunately, today, that is not the case. As the Chicago Tribune editorial concludes, when it comes to men's basketball, though, "most schools apparently care more about winning than anything else. That approach creates far too many losers."
Mr. President, I yield the floor and suggest the absence of a quorum.

The PRESIDING OFFICER. Will the Senator withhold his suggestion of the absence of a quorum?

Mr. DURBIN. Yes, I will.