The NCAA News - Briefly in the News

February 24, 1997

A bill has been introduced in the Tennessee legislature that would require equal base pay for all coaches and athletics directors at Tennessee colleges and universities.

State Rep. John Mark Windle cited the almost-$100,000 difference in the overall compensation package of University of Tennessee, Knoxville, men's athletics director Douglas A. Dickey and women's athletics director Joan C. Cronan as a reason for sponsoring the legislation.

According to an article in the Knoxville News-Sentinel, Tennessee President Joseph E. Johnson agrees that coaches should be paid fairly. However, he said the university guarantees only that coaches' base salaries will be equitable and that disparities may arise from additional money that coaches receive from endorsement and radio and television contracts.

"It's plain old good sense that people ought to be treated fairly," Johnson told the newspaper.

Windle, using figures provided by the Tennessee Higher Education Commission, noted that Tennessee women's basketball coach Pat Summitt -- the most successful and highest paid women's basketball coach in the nation -- has a higher base pay but a lower compensation package than men's basketball coach Kevin O'Neill.

A similar bill introduced several years ago did not pass.

"Girls' basketball is hot at this time in history," Windle said. "At almost every school in Tennessee, the female coach is paid less than the person who coaches the male basketball team....

"We need to show young women that they're just as important as young men."

Softball support

They do love their softball at California State University, Fresno.

Just three days shy of their season opener against the University of California, Los Angeles, the Bulldogs eclipsed the 1,000 mark in season-ticket sales. At last count, 1,010 season tickets have been sold.

The previous record at the softball-rabid institution was 962.

Mascot friction

More evidence that everything is fair game for courts and state legislators these days:

In the wake of the news that a Texas legislator had actually proposed legislation to exempt football playbooks from the Texas open-records law (his action was based on a lawsuit filed earlier in a Texas court), now comes the news that a fight over the Miami University (Ohio) mascot has reached the Ohio courts.

The Cincinnati Enquirer reported recently that nine Miami alumni were among 13 plaintiffs who sought a temporary restraining order to keep school officials from dropping the Redskins nickname.

Miami trustees had voted in September to eliminate the Redskins name after the Miami tribe of Oklahoma petitioned the university to stop using it.

Judge Michael Sage -- himself a Miami alum-- listened to the arguments and then denied the restraining order, saying he could not justify such a measure when "the plaintiffs have other adequate remedies."

"It was only a strident and vocal minority that brought about the change," plaintiff attorney Robert F. Croskery said. "It shut out from the process alumni who were Redskins once, are Redskins now and will be Redskins forever."

Since at least 1931, the Redskins name was used to honor the Miamis who inhabited the region during pioneer times.

"Redskins, in the context with which Miami University uses its name, is with utmost respect," John "Gray Hawk" Shearer, a businessman of Cherokee descent who joined Miami alumni in the lawsuit, told the Enquirer.

Bookworm

Student-athletes are very involved in community-service activities, and one of the more popular areas involves elementary-school reading programs.

Credit the Miami (Ohio) men's basketball team with using such a program to find the ultimate third-grade bookworm. Chad Weiss, a third-grader at Elda Elementary School in the Ross (Ohio) School district, was honored at half time of the recent Miami-Kent State University basketball game for having read 1,160 books between September and December as part of the Championship Reading Program.

-- Compiled by David Pickle