Posted on: Friday, April 27, 2001

NCAA basketball limits put on hold

Advertiser Staff

The Rainbow Classic, Maui Invitational and other early-season basketball tournaments received at least a two-year reprieve yesterday.

The NCAA Board of Directors postponed a final vote on legislation that would have established a 29-game regular-season limit for all Division I schools and stripped 30 events of their exempted status after the 2001-02 season.

Instead, the Board, which is comprised of university presidents, said it will wait until the completion of the 2003-04 season before deciding whether to approve the Division I Management Council's proposal.

"It's great news for now," said Aaron Griess, athletic director and basketball coach at Chaminade, which plays host to the Maui Invitational.

In the interim, the Board has asked several committees to study the issue and present reports by Jan. 2004 on missed class time, potential academic impact, television exposure and other topics. The Board has also adopted a moratorium on establishing new events or expanding existing ones.

"The Board still has an interest in setting a finite limit on the number of contests for basketball, but we also have concerns about the legislation as it came to us," said Brit Kirwan, Board chair.

Currently, schools may not play more than 28 games during the regular season unless they participate in an event certified by the NCAA. Certified events such as those operated by University of Hawai'i-Manoa, UH-Hilo, Chaminade, Hawai'i Pacific and Brigham Young-Hawai'i permit participating teams to play as many as four games while counting just one against the limit.

Without certification, which serves as an incentive and allows participating teams to recover their travel costs (by adding a home game), sponsors of the tournaments say they could not attract teams.

Board members claimed neither of the two pending lawsuits brought by sponsors nor pressure from Alaska and Hawai'i lawmakers resulted in the postponement.

"Democracy has won out over evil dictatorship," Gonzaga coach Mark Few told ESPN. "There wasn't a coach out there who was for it. If the players and coaches were against it, how can there be decisions without taking in the opinions of the coaches and players?"