Commission on College Basketball Releases Report

News link: http://www.espn.com/mens-college-basketball/story/_/id/23311712/commission-college-basketball-shares-recommendations-ncaa

WCC Statement: http://www.wccsports.com/genrel/042518aaa.html

West Coast Conference wrote:Today is a significant day for intercollegiate athletics and for the world of college basketball. While there is much work still to be done, the efforts of Secretary Rice and the Commission is a launching point for much-needed reforms. The West Coast Conference and its member institutions are committed to fair play and to preserving the student-athlete model. With a 66 -year history of success in basketball – including two national championships, nine Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame members and dozens of NBA players, the WCC is committed to the game of college basketball and welcomes positive changes for the game and the opportunity to help shape its future.

Overall a very weak report in my opinion. It asks people who profit from a particular system to own it and clean it up. There is zero incentive for a school who benefits from the current collegiate basketball model (i.e., a North Carolina) to want to accept any of these changes. In particular, it fails to really address the underlying economic problem that created this whole mess: an arbitrary restraint on the market value of a college basketball player.

Anyway, there is some good: allowing players to test the NBA waters and return without penalty, certifying agents, maybe creating an NCAA-run recruiting tournament instead of AAU, and tougher sanctions, including lifetime bans, for cheating (we will see if these ever get enforced).

The murky waters that I still need to decide on: locking athletes into scholarships if the NBA and NBPA does not address the age restriction for league entry (AKA: what created the one-and-done problem) and penalizing schools if a player leaves early from a scholarship.