NCAA President Meeting With Japan Officials To Discuss Collegiate Athletics Association

NCAA President Mark Emmert this week is "traveling to Tokyo to consult with government officials, sports industry leaders and at least 20 university presidents about Japan’s desire to form its own collegiate athletics association," according to Zach Schonbrun of the N.Y. TIMES. Japanese colleges are "considering modeling their new system" after the NCAA. If successful, Japan would "become one of the few countries outside the United States to establish an NCAA-type governing body for college athletics." Emmert described his Japanese visit as "'exploratory' and driven mostly by what he hears from American university leaders looking to bolster their international standing." Emmert: "We don’t have any grand design to spread the NCAA into some global enterprise." He said that many countries "distinguish between academics and athletics." Emmert added, "What I'm going to try to emphasize in Japan is those two things can go together quite nicely" (N.Y. TIMES, 8/28).