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Milk and cookies, early
bedtimes for recruits
By Steve Wilstein
©2004 The Associated Press
In the new world of college football recruiting, assistant coaches will
monitor brushing of teeth before tucking in players and reading them a
bedtime story.
Coaches must make sure recruits keep off the grass and walk in single file
between the athletic department and the field, the dorm and the dining hall.
Players are required to take daily urine, blood and lie detector tests, plus
swear on a stack of Bibles that they are free of sin and NCAA violations.
OK, maybe it hasn't come to that yet, but it's a shame it had to go as far
as it has. Blame a few players and coaches or blame a culture that links
football, drinking, sex and violence. Either way, it was time for a
crackdown.
Colorado did the right thing, the smart thing, perhaps the only thing it
could by setting up college football's strictest recruiting visit
restrictions. Other colleges can be expected to follow Colorado's lead,
perhaps pushed along by Congress and the NCAA.
After allegations of seven rapes by football players since 1997 and stories
of luring recruits with sex, Colorado officials could not have done anything
less than impose the restrictions they did.
Now it's time to do more - at Colorado and at other universities.
Colorado's new rules are a good start. Bars, strip clubs and private parties
are off-limits to recruits. Curfew is 11 p.m., with coaches doing bed
checks. No more player-hosts. Parents or coaches must supervise campus
visits. There's a one-night limit instead of two, and only in the offseason.
An exit interview with school or athletics officials is mandatory.
If it seems excessively protective, in these days of scandals it's safer to
err on the side of caution.
"As painful an experience as it may be, we view it as an opportunity to set
the standard for an issue all colleges and universities must be concerned
about," Colorado president Besty Hoffman said.
Asked if the new guidelines will hurt recruiting, chancellor Richard Byyny
shrugged: "It really doesn't matter. We want to have a model program."
The changes come as Congress has scheduled its first hearing on the use of
sex and other tactics in recruiting athletes.
We'll see how much Colorado wants a model program if the Buffaloes go 5-7
again, or sink to 1-11, and can't attract any top recruits. On the other
hand, maybe they'll find players who don't mind living like monks - at least
on a recruiting visit.
Even if the restrictions work, that doesn't address the larger issues.
It takes a commitment from the university, coaches and students to change a
campus scene at Colorado and elsewhere that revolves around drinking -
particularly binge drinking.
It takes courses, seminars and counseling - not just handbooks of rules - on
violence prevention in general and violence against women in particular.
The problem of campus rapes, involving athletes or not, isn't merely a
Colorado problem, it's a national disgrace. More often than not, drinking is
involved.
Colorado football coach Gary Barnett, on paid leave during the school's
investigation of his program, said he thought the new rules could only help
the Buffaloes' recruiting and spur other schools to take similar action.
"In some ways we've sort of thrown down the gauntlet and said, `Let's see
you match this standard,"' he said. "It sends a message to parents and young
people that we're going to have you spend a lot of time with our players,
and the social aspects of school you can get some other time."
Recruiting analyst Bob Gibbons countered that the restrictions are likely to
put Colorado at a disadvantage when it competes for athletes against schools
without such tough rules.
Recruits will feel belittled by the rules, he said, and some have come to
expect the royal party treatment when they visit schools.
Former Buffaloes quarterback Charles Johnson agreed, saying Colorado went
too far.
"The totality of the changes are more punishment than anything else, and it
sends the message to a parent and a young kid that we just don't trust you,"
Johnson said. "If anyone believes it's not going to adversely affect
recruiting, then they're sticking their heads in the sand."
Players are sticking their heads in the sand if they think the universities
can afford to ignore the problems that have been alleged at Colorado and
other schools.
If it keeps away recruits who are basing their decisions on boozy parties
and arranged escorts, that's not so bad. A school might as well find that
out from the start before investing in a four-year problem with a player.
The new rules, recruiting analyst Jeremy Crabtree said, are more likely to
help Colorado.
"It allows you to go out there and show parents and kids and high school
coaches that we're taking positive steps," Crabtree said, "and that we're
serious about football and serious about academics."
Now that's a novel idea for universities.
Copyright 2004
The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be
published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
02/23/2007 10:40:20 AM
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