Pat Griffin, professor of social justice
University of Massachusetts, Amherst
Washington Post

Discussing issues related to a coach's gender when it comes to recruiting:

"There are people out there operating under the incorrect assumption that if they hire male coaches it makes things safer for female players. My problem with the assumption is the belief that bringing in the lesbian coach means you're going to have more of a problem. That's just not true. ...

"Regardless of sexual gender or orientation, unwanted sexual attention is wrong. But so is the inaccurate assumption that lesbians pose a greater threat."

Andy Landers, head women's basketball coach
University of Georgia
Washington Post

"We live in the Bible Belt and often times when we are recruiting we get asked two questions that I find hard to answer. First, they ask if our kids attend church. Then they ask if any of our players are gay. We tell them that both are choices we leave to the athletes."

Dennis Rainey, president of FamilyLife (a division of Campus Crusade for Christ)
Washington Post

"Every parent who sends his son to play for Bobby Knight knows who he's sending his son to play for. A coach has a significant influence in a player's life. I just interviewed John Wooden for two hours, and I can promise you character does count. To me, as a parent of six children, sexual preference and practice are a reflection of a coach's character. They do matter."

Title IX

Michael Rosenberg, columnist
Detroit Free Press

"If college sports were a private business, most athletics directors would shut down every team but football and basketball. The others are almost all money losers, and money-losing divisions should get the ax, right? That's what GE does.

"But colleges are not GE and alumni are not shareholders. And you wonder what would happen if your school cut its football budget by 30 percent and paid its head coach $200,000 instead of five times that. Would there be a noticeable difference?

"You wonder what would happen . . . but what would happen is this: Capitalism would swirl in, somebody else would pay much more for the coach and spend much more on its football program, and the expensive bells and whistles would lure away recruits who think such things matter.

"And then your team might stink. And revenues would shrink. And that is every athletics director's fear.

"This is why schools run their football programs like businesses, spending money to make money. But these businesses have to support a whole bunch of other nonprofit organizations, an arrangement that simply isn't found anywhere else in society.

"And that is why Title IX is important. Without it, college sports would be all business."