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  Stanford Sports Info Charlotte Hornets Baron Davis is an emerging star, after playing two years at UCLA.

By Greg Schain

Daily Bruin Reporter Every year, big name high school basketball players skip college for the bright lights and money of the NBA. And several collegiate underclassmen declare for the NBA Draft, choosing not to finish their education. This exodus to the NBA, combined with the enormous pressure put on big program coaches to win every year, has made the recruiting strategy of a coach more important than ever. “Whether it’s Kentucky, Kansas, North Carolina, Arizona or UCLA, the expectations are to reload every year,” UCLA head coach Steve Lavin said. “Teams like that aren’t allowed to have a program that is in a rebuilding mode.” Being competitive every year is difficult in college basketball because of the constant turnover of the players. Coaches need to decide between going after players who they feel will stay for all four years of their eligibility, develop into leaders on the court, or recruiting players who can come in as freshmen, have an impact, but will likely leave for the NBA after a year or two. Lavin says he recruits players who he feels have the talent to declare as underclassmen, but may choose to stay at school anyway. “When you’re a major program like UCLA, you are going to recruit the top 50 players in the country,” he said. “Usually 20 or 25 will have an opportunity to declare early.” Since 1999, UCLA has had three players – Baron Davis, Jerome Moiso and JaRon Rush – declare for the NBA Draft  as underclassmen. But Lavin also says he wouldn’t recruit any player who he feels will likely leave for the NBA after one year, such as Memphis’ Dajuan Wagner. “We don’t waste time and energy on prospects that we feel will go to the NBA straight out of high school or after one year of college,” he said. However, smaller programs such as No. 15 Ball State can only dream of landing top-flight players like Wagner, despite his ambition to only stay in college a year.

  Stanford Sports Info More college experience could have helped Jerome Moiso. “You never know what’s going to happen in terms of a player’s career,” Ball State head coach Tim Buckley said. “You have to try to take the best available player, and if we had the opportunity to take someone like Dajuan Wagner, we probably would.”

However, a small school like Ball State is less likely to land a blue-chip player like Wagner because they lack the national exposure of the major programs. Therefore, the teams tend to exist of mostly four-year guys. Buckley says there are advantages to the stability that a program like his has to offer. “You get a great opportunity to build chemistry through stability, and the chemistry is really good on our team every year,” he said. “It gives you a better chance for success.” Whereas UCLA used to be known as a school that graduated all of its players, today graduating student-athletes is less of a priority. According to the most recent NCAA stats, based on the freshmen classes from 1991 through 1994, UCLA’s four-year graduation rate for men’s basketball is just 36 percent. The overall athletic program graduation rate stands at 59 percent. These numbers fluctuate yearly due to the small number of players in the program, but they rarely reach the numbers of UCLA’s glory years. Lavin blames the low graduation rate on the pressure put on him to produce a winning team every year. “If the Cal Bears go to the NIT for two consecutive years and then make the tournament and lose in the first round, it would be considered a good three-year run,” he said. “At UCLA, even three consecutive Sweet 16s might call for the termination of a head coach.” Cal’s graduation rate for the same period is only 18 percent. As for this year’s class, it is likely many will never don the cap and gown. Junior Jason Kapono is expected to be the next Bruin to leave for the NBA Draft before graduation. “We’re going about our business as if Jason isn’t coming back next year,” Lavin said. “If he comes back, it’s a bonus.” One action Lavin has taken already is redshirting Ray Young, so that the team has senior leadership next season. He is also recruiting more forwards to replace Kapono. This year’s Bruin freshmen might leave for the NBA early, too, although not after this season. Point guard Cedric Bozeman guaranteed his return for next year, even before he suffered his knee injury. “I’ll definitely be back next season,” he said. He said he’d like to stay four years, but couldn’t guarantee anything beyond next season. But Lavin is confident this year’s class of Bozeman, guard/forward Dijon Thompson and forward Andre Patterson will all graduate. “It wouldn’t surprise me if this year’s freshmen class stayed for their entire eligibility,” he said.

  Seattle SuperSonics Earl Watson thrives as a backup point guard for the Sonics.

Pay to Play? The NCAA’s most difficult challenge in the coming years is to try and find a way to reverse the trend of top players not graduating. Most likely, this will mean a fundamental change in the business model of college basketball. “The NCAA and the NABC (National Association of Basketball Coaches) know there is a need for a new model,” Lavin said. “In the last five or six years, there’s been a heightened awareness of this.” Currently, the only financial assistance available to student-athletes is from the NCAA’s Special Assistance Fund, which puts aside $10 million a year to help financially strapped players with clothing, school supplies, trips home and family emergencies. Under the $2 billion TV contract that the NCAA recently signed with CBS, $25 million more will be put aside in a newly created Student Athlete Opportunity Fund, which will be made available to all players. The most innovative move the NCAA is considering is a loan program for elite student athletes--ones that will likely be first-round NBA Draft choices – that will give them $20,000 a year in low-interest loans. The legislative body of the NCAA will consider the plan in April, and there will be no restrictions on how student-athletes spend the money. There are several ideas being tossed around among NCAA officials and coaches. The first is to pay the players. NCAA basketball is a billion-dollar industry, yet players, who are the main attraction, currently see none of that money.  Discussions are under way to start giving players stipends. “A stipend system wouldn’t prevent the top lottery picks from going to the NBA, where they can make eight to 12 million right off the bat,” he said. “But I’m thinking that from about the 12th pick in the draft on down, some of those players might choose to stay a year or two longer.” However, this idea is unpopular among NCAA brass because it would detract from the idea of college athletes being amateurs. “The overwhelming reason it probably won’t happen is a philosophical one,” said NCAA spokesman Wallace Renfro. “Higher education sees it as inappropriate.” Also hindering this plan are legal obstacles. “There are 360,000 student-athletes,” Renfro said. “Who would you pay? Only male basketball players? Is that fair? Is that legal?” The idea of creating a “power conference” in which the top 60 winning basketball schools in the country would participate in their own elite conference where athletes would get stipends, also has been tossed around. However, Renfro said this is also an unlikely scenario. “There’s been discussion about it for 30 years,” he said. “Who would those teams play? Just each other? Then half of them would be losers.” Discussions have also taken place by NBA suits to set a minimum playing age of 21. However, this proposal won’t happen in the near future for a myriad of legal reasons. Buckley is skeptical of all these proposals. “I don’t think you’re ever going to be able to keep players from going to the NBA early,” he said. “There’s too much opportunity for them financially.” Renfro agrees that there may never be a permanent solution to the college vs. NBA problem. “At the end of the day, it ends up being a personal decision,” he said. “It’s all about choices.”