Eating disorders may be legal issue

According to a professor at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, universities may be exposing themselves to legal liability by not giving enough attention to student-athletes with eating disorders.

Barbara Bickford, an assistant professor of exercise and sport science who specializes in legal issues in college sports, reports that by addressing the issue, coaches, trainers and administrators protect not only their university but also their student-athletes' well-being.

A report Bickford authored on the issue appeared in a recent issue of the Marquette Sports Law Journal. Her articles discusses universities' potential for legal liability if they continue to allow student-athletes with eating disorders to participate in sports. She also outlines a risk-management program that spells out what athletics departments can do to meet their legal duties to athletes and limit the school's liability in case of serious injury or death.

"When I was associate director of athletics at Brandeis University, I noticed many young women in New England Division III schools who appeared to have eating disorders," Bickford said. "I became increasingly frustrated with the increasing number of athletes who were visibly eating-disordered."

Bickford said the trend she noticed was most visible among track and field athletes, but that she also saw female soccer players and basketball players who were 20 percent or more below normal weight for their height. Bickford noted that every sport has athletes with eating disorders, but she said such disorders are especially prevalent in gymnastics, cross country, swimming and diving, synchronized swimming and figure skating.

"We're really talking about emaciated women competing in college athletics nationwide," she said. "Eating disorders are a serious health risk, particularly in sports because participants' bodies are being stressed not only by the eating disorder but also by the rigors of training and competition."

Bickford said she was frustrated by many coaches and administrators who ignored the problem, possibly because they thought it was a women's issue or because they thought they should not become involved in the student-athletes' personal lives. So she pursued it from a legal angle.

"I thought that if you could pose legal liability by making the argument that schools owe a duty to athletes who experience eating disorders," she said, "then maybe these people (who had been ignoring it) would take the problem seriously and give it the attention it deserves."

Bickford also wanted to offer a risk management program that would give administrators concrete ideas for implementation.

"Risk management includes an education program for athletics department personnel so that they can recognize symptoms and so they don't contribute to the problem themselves by making unrealistic weight-loss demands," she said. "It also involves pre-participation screening, including screening for eating disorders, intervention and treatment plans and nutrition education for athletes."

Pitcher 'cycles' in

For the first two months of the 2000 baseball season, Mike Fessler, a junior at Tennessee Technological University, was a pitcher who had never gone to bat in a college game. When he was inserted into the lineup in right field, however, his batting days began with a bang.

Fessler hit for the cycle in his first official collegiate at-bats and his first game as a position player. In helping Tennessee Tech sweep an Ohio Valley Conference double-header at Eastern Illinois University, Fessler went 4-for-4 with six RBIs in the 11-4 first-game victory. Fessler tripled in his first official collegiate at-bat in the second inning, hit a three-run opposite field homer in the third, a two-run single in the fifth, and an RBI double in the sixth.

It was the first cycle hit by a Golden Eagles batter since single-game records were established at Tennessee Tech in 1968.

Rob Schabert, sports information director at Tennessee Tech, is interested in finding out if others have heard of anyone hitting for the cycle in their batting debut. He can be contacted at 931/372-3088 or RSCHABERT@tntech.edu.

Friendly combat

This month, the Duke University wrestling team plans to take on some competitors who might have been enemies not long ago.

First up is a trip to Moscow, where the team will participate in a number of matches with university, club and national teams. Then it's on to Tehran, where the team will train with the Iranian national team as it prepares for the Summer Olympics in Sydney. The Duke wrestlers will be the first college team to visit Iran since the country's revolution in 1979.

The team, which participates in a nonscholarship program, is raising funds to cover individual costs of the trip. For more information, contact Duke head coach Clar Anderson at 919/681-0249.

-- Compiled by Kay Hawes

Number crunching

Lacrosse National Championships

All-time leaders in the number of national lacrosse championships won (Divisions I, II and III):

Men's

*Won two titles in Division II and 13 in Division III.

Women's