Girl scouts

For women, it's a whole new bowl game

You’re off on weekend junkets to football-crazed college towns like Ann Arbor, Mich., and Gainesville, Fla., and Lincoln, Neb. You schmooze with the college presidents and athletic officials. You stay in places like the Nittany Lion Inn. Squeeze in a round of golf, maybe.

You are, of course, a bowl scout.

And if there’s a sweeter gig in sports -- well, other than maybe hustling cities for the International Olympic Committee -- I’m not sure where you would find it.

Best of all, anybody can do the job. We’re not talking football genius here or an assignment just for stogie-sucking guys. Martha Burk, the worst nightmare of the Augusta National boys, would be pleased to know that women have risen to the level of bowl scouts, and in some cases even run New Year’s Day bowls.

This is a new game.

Before the bowls struck long-term deals locking in conferences, being a bowl scout was a real job. It was work. You had the king of hobnob, Jim “Hoss’’ Brock, and a cast of colorful guys hustling cloak-and-dagger style to seal a commitment from marquee programs.

A favorite ploy of Brock’s was to befriend a franchise player, such as Dan Marino, Doug Flutie or Eric Dickerson, who figured to influence his college team’s postseason destination. But why bother now striking up a friendship with Ken Dorsey, Maurice Clarett or Brad Banks?

Because of conference tie-ins to bowls, there are few secrets about where teams are headed. Competition is history. And so-called scouts are little more than nicely dressed greeters for the local Chamber of Commerce, no disrespect intended to our new breed of bowl reps.

Down in Orlando, where Florida Citrus Sports puts on a pair of bowls -- the Capital One Bowl (SEC vs. Big Ten No. 2) and the Tangerine Bowl (ACC No. 4 vs. Big 12 No. 5, 6 or 7) -- at least six women have been on the road scouting this season. Carol Monroe is in charge of team selection. Jane Hames sits as president of the bowl association.

Robin Kovaleski, a football fanatic and ex-scout, is an executive committee member of the Outback Bowl in Tampa. Susan Potter Norton just closed out her term as president of the Orange Bowl.

Clearly, who plays the game and its rules have changed.

“I’ve told people this is about generating money for college athletics," says Hames, head of a government relations consulting firm. “It’s not always about football. It’s about trying to get team payouts increased. So it is all about economics. And for the women who scout in our bowl, they are mostly in business. They’re either in a pretty senior level position in a big company or have their own company. So they are into the math. So they make good scouts."

These are the same folks seated around conference tables on Monday morning, rehashing what they learned on their weekend trips. No talk of X's and O's, really. What’s brought back is bottom-line stuff, details on how a particular school might promote the game to the number of fans projected to travel with the team.

Of course, there’s an occasional horror story along the way. Word has the Big Ten Conference, for instance, being a tad more accepting of female scouts than, say, the SEC or Big 12.

“The Big 12, they just kind of looked at me when I got out there," says Hames, laughing. “I had a guy actually ask me, ‘OK, darling, come sit next to me and tell me just how you managed to get yourself to be the president of this here bowl game.'"

Right on her home turf, says Hames, Michigan coach Lloyd Carr refused her entry to the locker room for the trophy presentation after last year’s loss to Tennessee.

“The coach said, ‘No, no girls in here,'" Hames recalls. “I told him, ‘I’m over 50 years old and if [you] want to call me a girl that is fine by me.'"

But aside from such snafus, everyone seems fine with the ladies joining the blazer crowd. And just for laughs, Hames has been known to introduce herself to some athletic directors as the bowl’s committee’s Title IX member, though her humor may not always be appreciated.

“At some colleges that is a pretty sore subject," she says. “These guys don’t like having their money siphoned off for the girls [sports]."

That, too, is changing -- while being a bowl scout remains a nice assignment.

Mike Fish is a senior writer for CNNSI.com.

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