When Cedric Dempsey completes his term as the Association's third CEO next month, his legacy surely will be replete with record television-rights agreements, a restructured governance and a gleaming new headquarters complex in Indianapolis.

Those are easy clips to include in the former University of Arizona athletics director's nine-year highlight reel.

Pundits could claim that he was the presidents' president because he gave institutional CEOs more control over decisions, or that he was the administrators' president because he federated the governance structure. They could even say Dempsey was the bean counters' president because he spearheaded an 11-year, $6.2 billion contract with CBS and ESPN.

But a closer look may reveal that Dempsey should be remembered for being the student-athletes' president. Ask him about his accomplishments and student-athlete welfare is quick to emerge.

Championships opportunities, particularly for women, doubled under his watch. Student-athlete advisory committees went from an idea to a hundreds-strong campus conglomerate and national groups for each division. The Leadership Conference became a marquee annual event that attracts more than 350 student-athlete leaders who covet the experience.

Even the big-ticket items -- the TV contracts and the restructuring -- have Dempsey's student-athlete fingerprints on them. The rights fees led to a multimillion-dollar Student-Athlete Opportunity Fund, as well as funding for more services and programs such as postgraduate scholarships and ethnic minority internships. And the new governance structure gives student-athletes a stronger voice in legislative decisions that affect them.

Dempsey's student-athlete interests are easy to understand -- he was one. At a recent alumni group gathering at Albion College, where Dempsey was a prominent basketball student-athlete, he related a turning point in his stance on diversity, something Dempsey has worked hard to instill in the national office staff and in the membership during his presidential tenure.

During a game in Dempsey's senior year against rival Adrian College, Dempsey was assigned the task of guarding a gifted black student-athlete. Dempsey drew four charging fouls on his opponent, the last of which fouled him out of the game. But on the walk to the free-throw line, the white official who made the call told Dempsey: "We finally got that black b------ out of the game, didn't we?"

Dempsey was crushed and told his coach what the referee had said. That official never worked another college game.

"I felt so full of accomplishment about playing great defense," Dempsey said. "I thought I was playing my opponent even, but the guy with the whistle was seeing things differently."

Then after a calculated pause, Dempsey said, "Do you think I'd be as passionate about diversity if it weren't for my experiences as a student-athlete?"

A decade of change

Diversity is just one of several initiatives Dempsey is proud to claim. Under his watch, the national office staff went from having 21.7 percent of its management positions filled by women and 8.7 percent by Blacks to 36 percent by women and 20 percent by Blacks. That was a conscious effort on Dempsey's part that he has urged other athletics administrators to share.

Other Dempsey-era landmarks are:

Even before the move, Dempsey arranged departments to better align with membership needs. He established the education services group; built the branding, broadcasting and promotions group from the ground up; and increased the size and scope of the information technology staff. Dempsey also established internal legal counsel, as well as a government relations staff in Washington, D.C.

"We've seen the value of having counsel help us work through legislative matters since everything we do today is scrutinized from a legal perspective," Dempsey said. "And the Washington, D.C., office has helped integrate the NCAA with other higher education organizations."

Dempsey also is proud of the Association's efforts to back federal legislation to ban wagering on college sports. Though the bill has not yet succeeded on Capitol Hill, Dempsey said the initiative has raised awareness on college campuses. Athletics administrators now are more adept at managing the problem, he said.

He's also happy with increased presidential involvement in Division I football and basketball, as evidenced by presidential study groups appointed within the last three years in both sports.

Then there are the student-athlete initiatives. Dempsey's staff at Arizona was one of the first to initiate a Student-Athlete Advisory Committee (SAAC). Now there are three division bodies and SAACs at most institutions and conferences. The Divisions I and III Management Councils have student-athlete representatives (voting representatives in Division III), and every Association-wide committee has a student-athlete presence. The strength of that structure manifested itself when an outside group, the Collegiate Athletes Coalition, challenged NCAA practices. The national SAACs worked to reassure student-athletes that the NCAA structure -- and not external pressure -- was the proper way to protect and enhance student-athlete interests.

In his State of the Association address at the 1999 NCAA Convention, Dempsey told delegates that the NCAA's top priority was "assuring that student-athletes were at the heart of our decision-making."

"As unassailable as this priority is," he said, "this also is our most vulnerable endeavor. Nowhere is walking the walk more important than in assuring the welfare of student-athletes."

To be sure, the phrase "student-athlete welfare" has become increasingly tied to legislative proposals and budget requests since then. Though Dempsey would be the first to admit that more work remains, most athletics administrators -- and student-athletes -- would agree that student-athletes enjoy a better athletics and educational experience now than their predecessors did.

Advancing the mission

Dempsey has been more vocal lately about reminding guardians of the athletics enterprise to adhere to that educational mission -- in the best interests of student-athletes. Recently enhanced eligibility standards in Divisions I and II might be proof that his audience is listening.

Still, Dempsey thinks the next decade holds the key to whether the Association will remain anchored in higher education or drift toward big business -- simply because the breadth of the television contract gives the NCAA its best chance to show what it stands for.

"If we can't retain the educational mission over this next decade -- if we continually treat intercollegiate athletics as a business venture, then I think we have serious problems," he said.

Dempsey thinks presidents will keep the NCAA grounded in its educational roots, though they face their own demons. Presidents may be in control, particularly in Division I, but that control is concentrated in the hands of a few.

"Presidents used to really push and garner support for issues before the Convention," Dempsey noted. "They would say, 'This is the Presidents Commission's position,' and many presidents would just fall in line with that. Currently, even though presidents have control, CEOs are much more representative than advocates now -- they were advocates before restructuring.

"In our new structure, conference offices are now serving in that leadership role. CEOs look to conference offices more for leadership. I'm not being critical of the conference offices, but structurally, that's what we have."

But Dempsey has challenged presidents to be more involved. So has the Knight Foundation Commission on Intercollegiate Athletics. The primary challenge for CEOs? To Dempsey, it's what he calls "the funding dilemma," where dollars -- and not necessarily what's best for intercollegiate sports -- drive decisions.

"One of the weaknesses in the leadership throughout the structure, particularly in Division I, is that we don't always function according to the greater good," Dempsey said. "We're often forced to make decisions that are prompted by what's in the best interests of individual institutions or conferences.

"Much of that is due to the funding dilemma. People just don't make funding decisions that aren't in their best interests. That's the real challenge for the future. How do people regain that attitude of accepting the will of the membership and how do we reduce the funding dilemma in order to reduce the financial pressure on member schools? That's the biggest challenge."

Dempsey acknowledged that the funding dilemma will be a tough issue, especially since the trend is to reward commissioners, coaches and administrators through financial incentives that occasionally encourage decisions that are not in the best interests of intercollegiate athletics.

"Do you think the drive to have more bowl games is tied to providing greater opportunities for student-athletes? Or is it because the athletics director or coach gets a bonus for reaching a bowl?" Dempsey said.

'Hope for the future'

Dempsey likes to quip that the two worst jobs in the country are to be president of the United States and president of the NCAA, but being president of the NCAA is worse because there's no power.

But Dempsey has never approached the job as a grind, nor has he shied away from the many conflicts inherent in the position.

"I'll miss the challenges most, and I'll miss the people," he said. "I hope this place is better for me having worked here, and I hope intercollegiate athletics is better for me having worked in it."

Other than being a visiting professor at Albion, Dempsey isn't certain what he will do after December, though he's likely to remain involved in intercollegiate athletics -- he has been for five decades. He's not worried about his legacy, either. "I'll leave that for the historians to determine," he said.

But he does hope that the initiatives that have been implemented under his watch have a lingering impact. "Some legacies can't be evaluated until time passes," Dempsey said. "Look at President Johnson and his civil rights legislation -- he wasn't given much credit for that right after he left office, but he is evaluated much better now. The same thing was true for Truman. It takes a while to determine a legacy."

However long it takes, Dempsey will not soon forget his student-athlete roots. The student-athletes, he said, are who kept him going through eligibility debates, litigation, long hours of negotiations, extended travel and countless meetings.

"I've often felt that part of the responsibility of a professional is to be a good mentor," Dempsey said. "I hope I've had a positive impact on young people in that regard. I'll miss that kind of contact.

"Being around student-athletes and seeing them mature, and seeing how articulate and understanding they are, is special. When you get depressed by all the problems and issues, being around young people like our student-athletes gives you hope for the future.