On May 16, 12:22 pm, A. Jones <
ajo...@intrtek.com> wrote:
> Butler, Mich. St., WVU get top marks
> Associated Press
>
> INDIANAPOLIS -- West Virginia and Butler couldn't beat Duke at the
> Final Four. They both finished ahead of the Blue Devils in the
> classroom.
>
> Three of the men's Final Four teams -- the Bulldogs, Mountaineers and
> Michigan State -- made the NCAA's list of academic overachievers
> Wednesday while the national champs were left out.
>
> The biggest surprise on the list: West Virginia, whose coach, Bob
> Huggins, has repeatedly been criticized for not taking academics
> seriously. Huggins' Cincinnati teams had a 0.0 graduation rate for
> several seasons.
>
> "It's a commitment by the athletic department and the university to
> supply the resources to help the players succeed academically,"
> Huggins said in a statement released by the school. "I commend our
> guys not only for their performance on the floor but in their academic
> work in the classroom as well."
>
> NCAA officials annually honor the top 10 percent of teams in each
> sport and all teams with perfect Academic Progress Rate scores. This
> year, 841 teams made the list of so-called overachievers, including
> Oklahoma -- the only women's Final Four team to make the list. Last
> year, 767 teams were recognized.
>
> The actual scores, which will be released later this spring, cover the
> fall semester of 2005 through the spring semester of 2009. That means
> only two of those academic years came during Huggins' tenure. The
> other two were under John Beilein, who left for Michigan after
> 2006-07.
>
> Each athlete earns one point per semester for remaining academically
> eligible and another point each semester for remaining at that school
> or graduating. A mathematical formula is then used to correlate a
> team's score, with 1,000 points being perfect.
>
> It is the first time West Virginia made the list in men's basketball,
> and under Huggins, West Virginia's number improved. Last year, the
> Mountaineers had a 960. This year, the NCAA said, none of the honorees
> scored lower than 978.
>
> Just as surprising was not seeing Duke on the list. The Blue Devils
> had made it each of the past two years.
>
> Teams lose one point if players transfer or leave early for the NBA
> and a second point if they are not in good academic standing when they
> leave. Duke had three transfers count against its score during that
> four-year period, though it doesn't mean the Blue Devils fell below
> the 925 threshold, which can lead to sanctions for teams with
> consistently poor scores.
>
> Duke also wasn't the only national champion left off the list.
> Connecticut, which won the women's basketball title, and Alabama,
> which won the BCS title game, were also missing.
>
> "Most Division I student-athletes and teams take seriously their dual
> responsibilities in the classroom and on the court or field of play,"
> interim NCAA president Jim Isch said in a statement. "But every year
> there is a special category of teams that perform exceptionally well
> and deserve this noteworthy recognition."
>
> Butler, the national runner-up, joined the academic overachievers for
> the first time and was one of 13 schools to have their men's and
> women's basketball teams make the list.
>
> Coach Brad Stevens was not surprised since the school has
> traditionally not had many players leave the program early, transfer
> or run into academic problems.
>
> "It's just like having a very good basketball team, you want them to
> put in the work in the classroom so those guys are prepared for life
> after basketball," he said. "We want them to be really ambitious and
> competitive in the classroom, too, and I think anything we do is a
> direct reflection of the relationship we have with our school leaders.
> They play a huge role in that, and that's why Butler is such a great
> story."
>
> North Carolina's men's basketball team extended its run of consecutive
> appearances on the list to five. The Kansas basketball team, which Roy
> Williams coached before returning to Chapel Hill, N.C., has made it
> three consecutive years.
>
> Only eight teams that played in a bowl game or the Football
> Championship Subdivision playoffs were honored, including the 2008 and
> 2009 FCS champions, Richmond and Villanova.
>
> Yale led all schools with the most teams on the list (24) for the
> fourth straight time. Dartmouth was next with 22 and Pennsylvania was
> third with 20.
>
> The Ivy League had 135 teams make the cut, the most of any conference.
> The Patriot League was second with 90 teams, followed by the Big East
> with 70.
>
> Three-hundred nineteen teams have made the list in all five years it
> has been released by the NCAA.
>
>
http://sports.espn.go.com/ncb/news/story?id=5183738>
> --
> DISCUSS THIS TOPIC AT...
>
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/WVU-SportsVW provides "the resources" to help it's athelete's succeed
academically? Is that just another way of saying "we provide the best
cheating rings"?