Scorecard

Death of a Flawed Rule
The NCAA Loses Its Props

Few rules in sports history have triggered more fiery debate than the NCAA legislation that was born in 1983 as Proposition 48 and was struck down last week as an example of racial bias. Designed to raise graduation rates among college athletes, Prop 48 and its '92 successor, Proposition 16, required incoming freshmen to meet academic standards—including minimum scores on the SAT or the ACT—to play sports their first year.

The rule's demands became part of college sports shorthand. Athletes who failed to meet the minimums were called Prop 48s. Recruits were divided into those who "had the score" of 700 on the SAT and those who fell short The stakes got higher when Prop 16 lifted the bar by imposing a sliding scale requiring recruits with a 2.5 grade point average in high school core courses to score at least 820 on the SAT and those with a 2.0 to score at least 1010.

Critics said the requirements discriminated against minority students, and on March 8 judge Ronald Buckwalter of the U.S. district court in Philadelphia agreed. In a case brought by the Trial Lawyers for Public Justice on behalf of two athletes ruled ineligible under Prop 16, Buckwalter wrote that the NCAA's use of the SAT and ACT had an "unjustified" impact on black students. In the opinion Buckwalter cited evidence showing that 21.4% of black students who applied for Division I eligibility in 1997 failed to meet Prop 16 standards, compared to 4.2% of white students.

"Prop 48 should never have taken place—never," Temple basketball coach John Chaney said after last week's decision. Arkansas coach Nolan Richardson, a longtime foe of Props 48 and 16, began his news conference at the West Regional in Denver by crowing, "I'm a happy man."

Yet celebrations of the rules' demise may be premature. Unless the NCAA comes up with an alternative that the court accepts, the power to determine who plays and who doesn't will revert to the universities. That's bad news, given the depths to which some schools sink when wins and losses are at stake.

A stark reminder of how tawdry institutional abuse can get came last week when a former clerk in the University of Minnesota's academic-counseling unit claimed that she had done schoolwork for 20 current and former Gophers basketball players. "Without a rule [like Prop 16], some institutions will exploit kids," says Bob Schaeffer, public education director for Fair Test, an advocacy group that opposes the use of standardized tests in college admissions.

Props 48 and 16 weren't all bad. "They pushed marginal athletes to work harder in the classroom," says Lee Boyko, basketball coach at Rich Central, a predominantly black high school in suburban Chicago. The late Arthur Ashe also supported high standards for athletes. "Black educators were incensed," Ashe said of Prop 48's minimums. "I was incensed that they were incensed. They should have complained that the number wasn't higher."

Props 48 and 16 may have been misguided, but their goal was admirable. "There have to be certain standards if this is going to be college athletics," says Indiana basketball coach Bob Knight "Not everybody can go to college."

What's next? As a first step, the NCAA should end freshman eligibility. If first-year students were prohibited from playing, as they were from 1939 to 72, the Prop 16 dispute would disappear. Even Arkansas' Richardson favors making freshmen ineligible to give them time to hit the books. Razorbacks forward Dionisio Gomez, who's sitting out his freshman year as a nonqualifier, agrees. "Looking back," says Gomez, "it's been a good year for me to practice, learn defense, train hard in the weight room and get ahead in academics." After failing to measure up academically a year ago, he now has a 3.11 GPA.