Sports ethics

Brenda Light Bredemeier, psychologist
University of Notre Dame
USA Today

Discussing how cheating in sports translates to cheating in other fields:

"First of all, there's no question that within sports is the great opportunity to teach moral values. The greatest predictor of moral behavior is the child's perception of how his or her coach and peers define success. That becomes the norm for the child. And athletes take that norm off the playing field and out onto the street."

Bill Cushing, regional youth sports director in Albany, New York
USA Today

"I'm very concerned that at even younger ages than ever before, our children are learning how the rules do not really matter unless you get caught breaking them, and if you do, the penalties are not really bad. Players are coached how to get away with fouls and how to get an unfair advantage as part of the game. Many parents are against this, but they are afraid of being humiliated by coaches if they complain."

Don DeVoe, head men's basketball coach
U.S. Naval Academy
Allentown (Pennsylvania) Morning Call

Discussing ethics in basketball:

"Too many coaches, in my opinion, make too much money, and with money comes tremendous pressure to have to do whatever you have to do to maintain your job, to extend your contract and to get good players. That's a big factor as to why coaches sometimes cross the line and do the things that are sometimes immoral.

"Last year, it was very obvious. Has this been happening? You bet it has, but at a lot of places it has not been detected. It was detected last year at a few areas in the country. Unfortunately, everybody kind of looks at these people and says, 'Well, they reflect all the coaches,' but that's not true."

Hazing

Norman Pollard, director of counseling/student development
Alfred University
USA Today

"One of the things we find is that the teammates who perpetrate the hazing are the ones who suffered it the year before, and they want to make it that much more dangerous, to validate their experience. ...

"Kids aren't spending a lot of time with adults. Kids are relying more on teams for stability than they ever have. Not just sports, but any type of team -- band, choir -- the kids feel it's a privilege to be associated with that team and there needs to be some sort of rite of passage, that you have to earn your right to belong."

Erika Karres, assistant professor
University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
USA Today

"When kids get together, whatever the most negatively creative thought one of them has is, it will be the common denominator. If there is one who's already committed violence somewhere else, that kid is going to dominate. It only happens in child and teen circles that the worst dominates the rest. There's never a team that says, 'Let's stop it.' "

Hank Nuwer, assistant professor
Franklin College
Sports Illustrated

"It's almost like we need different terms, like we have with manslaughter (and murder). Having someone put on silly clothes is called hazing, and so is sodomy. ...

"It can escalate in a single year with a single suggestion. The experts say, 'Look at the culture. Once you have a hazing culture and some sort of risky behavior, the chances are somebody's going to escalate it and something's going to go wrong.' It would be really rare that the very first time we do hazing we have something bad occur. It's usually a pattern over some years."

Reform

John Gerdy, former college athletics administrator
Dallas Morning News

Discussing the need for all intercollegiate athletics stakeholders to concentrate on the reform movement:

"I believe we're beginning to build a critical mass that is raising the right questions. None of these groups is going to do it on their own. Trustees. Faculty. Student-athletes. It (college athletics) needs to be hit on all levels. If it doesn't happen within the next five or 10 years, economics will drive us out of business, or the courts will. So we really need to do something."