Members of the Knight Commission on Intercollegiate Athletics have "called for widespread reform of the NCAA," according to Matt Murschel of the ORLANDO SENTINEL. Using the recent report from the NCAA’s Commission on College Basketball "as a catalyst, the group urged university leaders to take this moment as an opportunity to make changes to NCAA governance to 'restore public faith in the governing body’s ability to oversee major revenue-producing college sports.'" The Knight Commission "proposed the NCAA move away from its current membership association model to one that incorporates outside leaders." That includes "potentially adding six independent directors" to the NCAA’s D-I BOD (ORLANDO SENTINEL, 5/8). In Philadelphia, Frank Fitzpatrick noted much of the change the Knight Commission supported "was spelled out in a recent report by the NCAA Commission on College Basketball," but at least two who addressed the Knight Commission yesterday "suggested that without a provision to compensate athletes, any new regulations would fail." ESPN's Jay Bilas, who has been an advocate of paying players, said, "Money and education are not mutually exclusive. (Unless players are paid,) these reforms won’t work and we’ll be here in the future with another package of reforms" (PHILLY.com, 5/7). In Portland, Jeff Manning notes the panel's recommendations "went further than the NCAA's own basketball reform committee." The Knight Commission "wants to ban coaches from cutting individual deals with shoe and apparel companies that obligate athletes to wear branded apparel on the field of play." It said that "only university presidents should be empowered to make such deals" (Portland OREGONIAN, 5/8).
SYSTEMATIC ISSUES? Kylia Carter, the mother of former Duke basketball player Wendell Carter Jr., said that the NCAA college basketball system is "comparable to slavery and prison in its exploitation of labor." Carter said, "The problem that I see is not with the student-athlete, it’s not with the coaches and the institutions of higher learning, but it’s with a system like the only system I have ever seen where the laborers are the only people that are not being compensated for the work that they do, while those in charge receive mighty compensation. The only two systems where I've known that to be in place is slavery and the prison system, and now I see the NCAA as overseers of a system that is identical to that" (MCCLATCHYDC.com, 5/7).
