Lute Olson, men's basketball coach
University of Arizona
St. Paul Pioneer Press

"As bad as it is now, it's going to get worse. With the advent of all of the sports that are dependent on football and basketball, you have to fill the arena, you have to fill the stadium. If you don't, it's not a case of the administrators really having much of a choice (to retain or release the coach) because they've got a huge budget they've got to take care of."

Gene Keady, men's basketball coach
Purdue University
St. Paul Pioneer Press

"I think the three most important things are winning big, graduating your kids and doing things right -- that probably is not the bottom line for some athletics directors. They'll give you that baloney about you've gotta graduate, you've gotta do this, you've gotta do that. But they want you to win big, basically.

"It's a situation where, no question, because they pay you what everybody thinks is a lot of money, you're accountable to win big. If they're going to pay you some money, you're going to have to have some results."

Pay for play

Thomas C. Hansen, commissioner
Pacific-10 Conference
USA Today

"When the head coach was earning $100,000 and the youngster was getting a grant-in-aid worth, say, $20,000 a year, it was in the same ballpark, at least. But now, when you're talking about a $1 million contract, or one well over $500,000, it does raise more questions in the minds of student-athletes about who's generating the money and where it is going. That's only to be expected, that they will think about it. And we have to have an answer."

Basketball issues

Gerald Gurney, associate athletics director for academic affairs
University of Oklahoma
Dayton Daily News

"As someone who has spent 21 years in four different colleges, I would prefer having minor leagues develop for those athletes whose goal is professional basketball. I would rather have a student go to a university who wants an education as well as an opportunity to play sports. What I don't want to see is a university taking on the role of being in the minor leagues."

Style of college basketball

Elaine Elliott, women's basketball coach
University of Utah
St. Louis Post-Dispatch

"The women's game itself is still about the game, still about the team. It's still about the emotion and the experience and the process, and that's what I want to see stay a part of our women's game and not follow the complete model of the men's game."

Cheryl Burnett, women's basketball coach
Southwest Missouri State University
St. Louis Post-Dispatch

"It's definitely a difference between over the rim and under the rim. And because it's not over the rim and as much one-on-one, to be as good a team as you want to be, you have to be more team-oriented. And I think that characteristic carries over into a lot of other things."

American Indian mascots

John J. Miller, columnist
National Review

"Because of these positive associations, tribal names find their way onto all kinds of consumer products, such as the Jeep Cherokee and the Dodge Dakota. For the same reason, Indian images appear on U.S. currency, such as the old Indian-head nickel and the new Sacajawea dollar. The Army even names its helicopters after tribes: the Apache Longbow, the Kiowa Warrior, the Comanche, and the Blackhawk. If we were to follow (the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights' claim that Indian team names perpetuate harmful stereotypes and foster a racially hostile environment) to its logical conclusion, a number of cities (for example, Chicago, Miami, and Milwaukee), plus about half the states, would have to be renamed. ...

"It's tempting to think that the same activists who now complain that the presence of Indian team names is an insult would then say that the absence of Indian team names is proof of racism. And in that latter claim, there would be substantially more justice."