Myles Brand Discusses Cancer Diagnosis, Reflects On NCAA Career

Brand Says Diagnosis Has Taken  Away 25% Of The Rest Of His Life

NCAA President Myles Brand said he was "very upset, to say the least" when he heard he had been diagnosed with stage four pancreatic cancer, according to a sports section cover story by Steve Wieberg of USA TODAY. In his first public comments since the prognosis late last year, Brand said the diagnosis has "taken away 25% of the rest of my life." But he added that his doctors "have not given him a medical timetable." Brand "still makes it to his office regularly, though not for full days," and he also "works from his home by phone and e-mail." Brand is "visibly thinner," and he said that chemotherapy treatments "every two weeks leave him fatigued." However, Brand said he will remain in his position "as long as I'm able to contribute in a full-blown way, as long as I'm able to add some value to the position and help the NCAA stay on course." The NCAA Division I men's basketball Final Four will be staged in Detroit in April, and Brand "plans to be there."

DEEP IMPACT: National Association of Basketball Coaches Exec Dir Jim Haney said Brand has "really had a significant impact on the service aspect of the NCAA." Brand "successfully threw his weight behind a series of academic measures, first toughening standards requiring athletes to make annual progress toward degrees and then subjecting lagging teams to unprecedented penalties." Athletes' graduation rates have "subsequently risen and now eclipse those of the overall collective student body." Brand "points to those gains as his crowning achievement." Brand: "I feel good about what's happened with the NCAA. I feel good about what's happened with college sports. I don't feel good about the fact that I'm not able to complete everything I'd like to complete." Wieberg notes "one note of discord" Brand receives is that a majority of top-tier BCS berths and 85% of the more than $220M in overall FBS postseason revenue are given to major Division I conferences and programs. Some officials "questioned why Brand hasn't tried to engage it from his bully pulpit." Brand also has worked "two other areas with what he acknowledges is limited success, trying to persuade schools to rein in rampant spending on sports and prod football into improving its abysmal minority hiring record" (USA TODAY, 2/17).