NCAA SPORT.

Interview By Ben Weber 

WHERE IT IS AND WHERE IT'S GOING

Direct from NCAA President, Cedric Dempsey 

COACH: Your roots as a major executive director had their beginnings at Albion College in Michigan. What led you to attend this small Methodist college?

DEMPSEY: After graduating from Wayne (MI) High School, I had a choice of three Big Ten schools -- Michigan, Michigan State, and Minnesota. I had played my last high school basketball game -- the state regional finals -- in the Albion arena and I had liked everything about the school. I had grown up in a very small community in Equality, IL, was still maturing at that point, and really felt Albion offered a better atmosphere for me to grow in, so I decided to go there.

It was a wise decision. Albion proved outstanding both academically and athletically, and I received a lot of guidance from my coaches (I played football, basketball, and baseball).

After graduating from Albion, I stayed on as a graduate assistant. I was the head coach in tennis and an assistant coach in football and basketball. I got my master's degree in 1956 and then went on to the University of Illinois to pursue a doctorate in exercise physiology as a research graduate assistant.

I spent three years at Illinois and left after I got all of my coursework completed. I then returned to Albion and spent three years teaching and coaching. In 1963, I completed the dissertation for my Ph. D. from Illinois.

COACH: How did you become involved in athletic administration?

DEMPSEY: My first administrative experience was at Albion in student personnel work. From then on, I kept volunteering for administrative tasks, even when I was working on my doctorate at Illinois. I actually ran the summer school program one year.

COACH: Who were the dominant influences as you moved on in your career as an athletic director at the U. of Pacific, San Diego State, U. of Houston, and then at Arizona from 1982-93?

DEMPSEY: I could go farther back than that. The most dominant mentor for me was my basketball coach at Albion, Elkin Issac, who was a Phi Beta Kappa and a wonderful human being.

He guided my academic journey from master's to Ph. D. and he encouraged me to finish my education before heading out into the professional world.

When I was offered a high school job right out of college, he convinced me to turn it down and pursue my master's. After I got my master's, I had an opportunity to become the head coach at a university, but he encouraged me to pursue a Ph. D.

My education prepared me to make the kind of decisions I have had to make all my life.

COACH: You raised the Arizona athletic budget from $6 million to $15 million during your tenure and by the time you left the program was turning a yearly profit of around $500,000. How did you become a financial genius?

DEMPSEY: Blame it on the practical experience I had in coaching and administration.

When I took over as the A.D. at Arizona the program was $450,000 in debt and I was told that if we intended to improve any facilities we'd have to generate our own funds. That forced us to speed up our education in marketing, fundraising, and the business part of the operation.

COACH: Did your philosophy of administration change any in your 35 years of athletic directing at five universities?

DEMPSEY: I believe my core philosophy has not changed - that the major mission of intercollegiate sports is still education. That is the only way you can justify intercollegiate sports on a college campus.

What has added depth to that understanding is my experience with a number of Division I programs. Most institutions of higher education have three basic purposes - teaching, research, and public service. I didn't realize the importance of the public service component of a sports program until I took the position at Pacific. When I moved on to more successful programs, it became obvious.

COACH: When you were appointed the executive director of the NCAA in 1994, you were viewed as somewhat of an Honest Abe who was going to clean up the NCAA. Did you see yourself as a reformer?

DEMPSEY: Hopefully, we've accomplished a few things that have made us a more effective association. I think the federation of the three divisions, allowing each division to establish its own mission and operate independently has really enhanced Division II and Division III.

I also believe we've made some significant progress in putting a face on the national office. We've tried to change the culture of the national office and help our membership and the public understand the work of the Association. And certainly, a major contribution to that has been our move from Kansas City to Indianapolis.

We can now hold our committee meetings at the national office. Since March, we've had over 500 meetings in our facility, and it has enhanced our relationship with the membership and the community.

Some of the most important issues before us right now involve football and basketball. We're concerned with the arms race and want to refocus on our educational mission to see whether we can deregulate our rules and regulations.

I'm proud of our television negotiations and the enhanced revenue for our membership. It was the largest in dollar amount and length ever signed in sports. [CBS paid $6 billion to broadcast the Div. I Men's NCAA Basketball Tournament for 11 years starting in 2003.] I think it has stabilized and enhanced the opportunities for our student-athletes as well as helped our institutions.

COACH: Where is the NCAA headed with the deregulation of its rules?

DEMPSEY: Well, Division I has it out for comment within its membership and it is scheduled for vote at our convention in April.

COACH: High school coaches are wondering whether the NCAA will allow high school athletes to (1) accept prize money, (2) enter a professional draft and be drafted, (3) sign a contract for sports participation, (4) accept compensation for playing, (5) compete with professionals, and (6) accept educational expenses in specific situations.

Are their concerns warranted?

DEMPSEY: I think it's likely to pass in Division II, probably the entire package. I don't know, at this point, what kind of impact it will have and what the concerns of the high school community will be.

If Division I voted on the entire package right now, I don't think it would pass. It will probably provoke a tremendous amount of discussion leading up to the April meetings, and it may be decided to postpone the voting because of the lack of understanding.

The one area that our high schools seem to support concerns post-eligibility or post-entrance into the university.

One proviso that I expect to pass would allow student-athletes to receive money for winning a medal at the Olympics. There's financial support available for this in the Olympic model. Most people are comfortable with that provision and they do not view it as an erosion of amateurism.

Another proviso that seems to have some support is to allow elite student athletes (identified by the professional leagues) to borrow on future earnings or earning power. They would be able to borrow a certain amount every year for their educational program, enabling them to stay in school, finish their education, and maybe pursue a graduate degree.

I don't sense any great resistance to this, but it's new and something that will have to be totally understood before it goes through.

One of the major problems that we face with high school athletes is that while our rules and regulations have probably served as a guideline for high schools, we really have no right to apply them to prospective student-athletes.

Because of this, we find a lot of inconsistency in our interpretations of rules. To cite an example: In 1996 we had two young girls who had won gold medals in swimming and wanted to continue swimming in college. But if they were to take the money from the Olympic Gold Program, they would be ineligible to compete in college.

One girl came from a wealthy home and could afford to give up the $80,000 to do that. The other girl came from a lower-income family that had sacrificed a great deal to finance her training, and she couldn't afford to turn the award money down.

I think there is an inconsistency there and we end up favoring athletes who are financially able to resist the temptations of prize money, but it has very little to do with the competitiveness of intercollegiate sports.

We receive well over 1,000 requests a year for reinstatement of student-athletes who violated our rules. It sends a message for those of us in the national office: that many of our own people would like to see a lot of the rules changed.

For years the Association has tried to deregulate but every time we eliminate five pieces of legislation we usually add about 25. So we've got a 500-page manual of rules and regulations for Division I and every time we try to create or change it becomes uncomfortable.

It's going to be an interesting series of discussions and it is still problematic whether or not Division I is ready for any kind of major change. Division II, from its perspective, believes that deregulation is one of the best pieces of legislation it has to consider.

COACH: Do you think athletes will start opting for Division II over Division I?

DEMPSEY: It does present an interesting contrast, but I don't think the legislation will impact a tremendous number of student-athletes.

Basketball coaches are concerned with the Kobe Bryants coming back to play college ball. But they are not going to come back and play college ball, and most of the other drop-outs playing in the NBA don't want to come back and play college ball, either.

Some of the concerns about the changes are impractical. The kind of prospective student-athletes who will benefit from deregulation are the ones who received poor advice upon graduating from high school. Perhaps they opted to play major league baseball, but after a summer of traveling on the bus and living off of McDonald's, might wish to could come back and pursue a college education.

I believe our people understand that no unfair advantage was gained by the misguided young athletes and wonder what can be gained by making them permanently ineligible.

Consider some of the rules we have about professional athletes. If a player joins a tennis tour and if after a year or two he discovers that it's not what he wants to do, he can come back as an amateur -- at a loss of one year of eligibility for each year he competed professionally.

If someone played professional baseball for four years, he might not want to come back because he would have used up his eligibility.

Those are some of the issues at hand, and that's what will be thoroughly explored in the months ahead.

COACH: How do you view the early exodus of star college basketball players to the pros?

DEMPSEY: I don't view it as a problem. My concern has always been for the athletes who leave at a very early age and may still be immature emotionally and socially. To be placed in a professional environment where you basically have 20 hours of freedom a day with all the temptations of drugs, sex, etc., I have to wonder how many young athletes are ready to handle these kinds of pressures.

But I also have concerns about the kind of student-athlete who wants to come to school for a year or two merely to showcase his wares. That's not what a college education program is about.

I think an NBA minor league is an option for a young person out of high school who feels that a college education is not important. We've had discussions with the NBA and they have encouraged us to look at the loan-on-future-earnings program for these elite athletes. We'd also have a rule similar to our baseball rule.

That way, a student-athlete would be able to sign with the NBA out of high school, but once he enters college he would not be eligible to sign with the NBA for three years.

COACH: What is your answer to the media who believe that our Division I athletes should be paid for playing?

DEMPSEY: That's not what college is about. What we're trying to do is provide opportunities for young people to have a positive educational athletic experience that will help them in later years.

What we have tried to do is address the average difference between the full grant we provide and the cost of attending school. It works out to about $2,000 a year. For student athletes who need a winter coat and can't afford it, we try to provide a stipend through our Student Assistance Fund.

COACH: How will the NCAA change over the next five to ten years?

DEMPSEY: Hopefully, the major difference will be a refocusing of education as our primary purpose. The expectation that Division I programs should be self-sufficient has led to many problems:

1. The over-commercialization of many programs.

2. The tremendous salaries.

3. The pressure on coaches to win and produce income.

Certainly, one of our major initiatives will be to reduce the impact of the financial mission, not to reduce the dollars, but to change the financial model under which athletic departments operate.

At one time athletic departments presented expense budgets to the institution and any revenues above those expenses went to the institution. That way the athletic department had some responsibility to the institution and vice versa. Whenever the necessity to generate funds becomes the primary purpose, it often reduces the educational objectives.