TUESDAY, JUNE 15, 2010 COLLEGES


A Texas two-step: Longhorns to stay put


Big 12 Conference looks to be revived with 10 members


by Josh Barr


The University of Texas pulled off a stunning reverse Monday, rejecting an invitation from the Pacific-10 Conference and instead reviving a Big 12 Conference that had been thought to be on life support in recent days. A news conference is sched- uled for Tuesday morning to dis- cuss the decision, after which Big 12 Commissioner Dan Beebe is expected to address reporters. “University of Texas President


Bill Powers has informed us that the 10 remaining schools in the Big 12 Conference intend to stay together,” Pac-10 Commissioner Larry Scott said in a statement. “We will continue to evaluate fu- ture expansion opportunities under the guidelines previously set forth by our presidents and chancellors.” Texas’s decision likely will at least temporarily stop what had been looking like a full-scale re- alignment of the nation’s major college athletic conferences. In- stead of blowing up the current configuration and creating 16- team megaconferences, smaller changes seem likely, though an- other round could be set in mo- tion if the Big Ten opts for fur- ther expansion. Monday’s news capped a wild


weekend that saw Beebe pledge to fight to the finish to save his league while Scott jetted to pro- spective members to hand out invitations to join the league. It was thought that if Texas left for the Pac-10, Texas Tech, Okla- homa, Oklahoma State and per- haps Texas A&M would follow. At the same time, university presidents, chancellors, regents and athletic directors from re- maining Big 12 schools phoned their counterparts to plead with them to keep the league intact. “Our sense is that a 10-institu- tion Big 12 would provide even greater financial benefits than are currently being realized — at least on par if not above and be- yond those of the other major conferences in the nation,” wrote the Kansas Board of Re- gents, which oversees the Uni- versity of Kansas and Kansas State. In addition to an emotional appeal, Beebe’s last-ditch plan apparently included a proposed


television rights fees contract that could pump millions more dollars into the pockets of the remaining Big 12 schools. Maximizing television con-


tracts to provide each school’s athletic department with more money had been at the crux of the realignment discussions. Rumblings started last week, when Colorado and Nebraska left the Big 12 for the Pac-10 and Big Ten, respectively. Although officials from Texas,


Texas A&M and other remain- ing Big 12 members publicly said they preferred to keep the conference intact, those with potential suitors were privately negotiating to make sure they had a place to land should the Big 12 splinter. Nebraska Athletic Director


Tom Osborne said the Big 12’s instability had played a key role in the Cornhuskers’ decision to opt for the Big Ten. At that point, after Nebraska held a news conference Friday evening, it was widely assumed that Texas would follow the money to the Pac-10, which is believed to want to start a cable channel similar to the success- ful Big Ten Network. Texas Tech, Oklahoma, Oklahoma State were also in the Pac-10’s plans. Texas A&M was in the mix as well, though the Aggies also re- portedly were in discussions with the Southeastern Confer- ence about joining that league. Somehow, though, Beebe was able to sway Texas’s decision, apparently by presenting the case that a smaller Big 12 some- how would be able to procure a lucrative television contract. That would bring the league more in line with the Big Ten and Southeastern conferences, which distribute millions more to each of their member schools. ABC holds the rights to over- the-air Big 12 football and men’s basketball games through the 2015-16 school year, with ESPN holding the rights to broadcast Big 12 football games on cable through the same time period. The conference’s contract with Fox Sports Net to televise bas- ketball games on cable is up for renegotiation next year. Texas also is believed to retain its media rights, which would allow it to pursue its own cable channel. Utah could be the Pac-10’s


next target, which would create a 12-team league, meeting the NCAA’s minimum standard to hold a potentially lucrative con- ference football title game. barrj@washpost.com


KLMNO GOLF


“I had pretty much come to grips that I was never going to play golf again.” — Erik Compton, after his second heart transplant, in 2008. This week he will play in the U.S. Open at Pebble Beach


S


D3


Straight from the heart


Two transplants haven’t kept Compton off the course


MICHAEL COHEN/GETTY IMAGES


Golfer Erik Compton had a viral cardiomyopathy diagnosed at age 9 and three years later became the youngest transplant patient in the history of Jackson Memorial Hospital in Miami. “I’m always very, very inspired by the ‘no quit’ he has,” said his father, Peter.


by Barry Svrluga


pebble beach, calif. — By the time Erik Compton takes to the Pebble Beach Golf Links on Thursday for the first round of the U.S. Open — the first major championship in what, on paper, looks to be an unremarkable ca- reer — the shadows will be long, the galleries thin. The Pacific Ocean looks stunning as the sun sets, but not many golf fans will make it a point to trudge along the cliffs to watch Compton — some 30-year-old from Miami, an Open qualifier — play with Rus- sell Henley and Jason Allred. The threesome has, among them, two competitive Open rounds in its past, and with a tee time after 2:30 p.m., the stars will have de- parted the course, and the fans will have followed them to din- ner, discussing all they have seen. Maybe they should, however,


be discussing Compton. His stats: two victories on the Canadian tour, two more on the Hooters Tour, another professional win in Morocco — what he calls the highlight of his career — and no standing whatsoever on the PGA Tour, the big show. Oh, and two heart transplants. “I’m always very, very inspired by the ‘no quit’ he has,” said his father, Peter.


ORLIN WAGNER/ASSOCIATED PRESS


Big 12 Commissioner Dan Beebe appears to be successful in his quest to save his conference after Texas turns down the Pac-10.


Of the 156 players in the field for the 110th U.S. Open — major winners and minor players, big names and no names — none has a story to match that of Compton. With a viral cardiomyopathy di- agnosed at age 9, a disease that


infects the heart muscle, he be- came, at 12, the youngest heart transplant patient in the history of Jackson Memorial Hospital in his home town of Miami. Some 16 years later, after he had made his way through the University of Georgia on a golf scholarship and turned professional, he was fish- ing on a golf course when he felt some tingling in his arm. His heart had worn down and out. He called his mother, Eli, who said what a mother would say: Get yourself to a hospital. “Just like Erik would,” Peter Compton said, “he drove himself to the hospital,” blowing through a toll booth, and Peter even has the picture from the ticket to prove it. Upon arrival, Erik told the staff that they better for- get the check-in process, “or they wouldn’t have anybody to check in,” Peter said. That episode, late in 2007, eventually brought on heart transplant No. 2, early in 2008. He was 28, married, ready to start a family — and figuring he was done with golf. “I had pretty much come to grips that I was never going to play golf again,” Compton said. He sold all his equipment. He was, in his mind, done. There was, though, no indica- tion in Compton’s past that he would truly quit. There were times, when Erik was a kid, when Peter and Eli Compton thought they might lose their boy to the


HIGH SCHOOLS D.C. public school student-athletes struggle to be eligible for college sports eligibility from D1


over?” There are plenty of success sto- ries, including Dunbar football players Vernon and Vontae Davis and Arrelious Benn, each of whom had a standout college ca- reer and are now in the NFL; Tia Bell, who graduated from H.D. Woodson in 2007 and made the ACC academic honor roll while playing basketball at N.C. State, where she will enter her senior year this fall; and the Dunbar girls’ track team, under the direc- tion of Coach Marvin Parker, which has had impressive success with placing its athletes on col- lege rosters or on academic schol- arships.


But not all the city’s top public school athletes are so fortunate. According to the NCAA’s National Letter of Intent office, which tracks all high school seniors and junior-college transfers who sign scholarship papers, 25 of 60 sen- iors who signed with Division I football, men’s or women’s bas- ketball programs from 2004 to 2009 failed to meet NCAA re- quirements upon graduation. In 2003, the NCAA raised its


core-curriculum course require- ment from 14 to 16 for students entering college in fall 2008, meaning students must pass four years each of math, science and English, and two apiece in his-


tory and a foreign language. It was not until 2007, though, that D.C. Public Schools raised its di- ploma requirements from three to four years apiece for math and science.


Since the start of the 2007-08 academic year, D.C. Public Schools graduation requirements exceed the NCAA’s qualification standards. At a mandatory 24 credits, they are among the most stringent in the Washington area, surpassing Fairfax and Mont- gomery counties (22 credits each) and Prince George’s (21). Ransford, who enrolled at H.D.


Woodson in the fall of 2006, said guidance counselor Carl Allen told her last September that the NCAA would not accept her freshman English class. She said Allen told her the school would petition the NCAA to accept it by showing the material covered met the criteria for ninth-grade level coursework. By the time she signed with Georgia, Andy Land- ers, the Georgia coach, told her she needed to find an alternative class that met NCAA standards. Ransford paid $124 to sign up for an independent studies course administered online by Brigham Young University.


Allen, who has worked in


Woodson’s guidance department for 10 years, said he oversees about 200 students. He declined to discuss Ransford’s case.


H.D. Woodson’s 2008 and 2009


graduating classes featured four players – Patrice Johnson in 2008, and Bernisha Pinkett, Je- niece Johnson and Carleeda Green in 2009 – who signed let- ters-of-intent, but were academi- cally ineligible or deferred their enrollments to satisfy school ad- mission requirements. In the spring of her senior year,


Patrice Johnson signed to play basketball at Wake Forest, which told her she only had 151


⁄2 core-


courses fulfilled. Her mother, Janice, said she successfully peti- tioned Wake Forest to accept her daughter’s business law class as a core course, though Patrice still needed to use the fall 2008 se- mester to improve her SAT score to meet Wake Forest admission standards. She enrolled during the second semester of the 2008- 09 school year. “The folks at Woodson had no idea about core courses,” Janice Johnson said. “I had to teach the guidance counselors about it.” H.D. Woodson girls’ basketball Coach Frank Oliver declined to comment for this story. Another hurdle for D.C. public school athletes is standardized test scores, which have been a fo- cus of Schools Chancellor Mi- chelle A. Rhee. Mean SAT scores for public school students in the District lag national scores, and those of neighboring Maryland


and Virginia, according to data provided by the College Board. Anacostia’s Travon Smith fin- ished his varsity basketball career in 2009 as the leading scorer in school history and was named his class valedictorian. Yet few four- year colleges pursued him for basketball because his SAT score was too low.


“I just couldn’t score enough


on that,” said Smith, who com- pleted his freshman year at SUNY Delhi, a two-year school in Up- state New York. “I don’t really like tests like that.” Maurice Butler, who is com-


pleting his 30th year as a teacher, administrator and coach at Theo- dore Roosevelt, said Smith’s story is not unique. Butler said there is a systemic aversion to standard- ized test-taking among District public school students, adding many athletes tend to wait until the last possible date to take the exam. “These kids have been taking [standardized] tests since the third grade,” Butler said. “A lot of them either haven’t done well or feel they won’t do well. If you con- tinually don’t do well, you think, ‘Why am I going to sit down and do this for four hours?’ ” Staff cutbacks to the guidance system have added to the prob- lem, school administrators said. Wilson, the largest public high school in the District, has five


counselors for nearly 1,500 stu- dents. Theodore Roosevelt had its guidance department cut from four to two this academic year for a 753-member student body. “The counselor is responsible for guidance,” Butler said. “If a kid is a scientist who’s taking all [Advanced Placement] courses, or if a kid is an athlete who wants to play in college, it really doesn’t matter. They should know what to do.” Athletes seeking to navigate the NCAA’s eligibility require- ments and match them with those of DCPS need their help. Upon entering school, ninth


graders are automatically eligible to play sports. To stay eligible, students do not need to adhere to the cumulative 2.0 grade-point average standard set by most school districts. For fall sports, ei- ther a 2.0 during the fourth and final advisory period for the pre- vious school year, or a 2.0 for the entire previous school year, is re- quired. For winter season, eligi- bility is determined by the second advisory period grades, and the spring season hinges upon the third advisory.


Because of this system, many


athletes manage to maintain their eligibility even though they may not be meeting NCAA stan- dards.


Derrell Person, who played football at Coolidge, managed to


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stay eligible each football season by achieving the 2.0 GPA during the fourth advisory of the previ- ous year. “Once I got that [2.0], I fell off,” he said. “After the sea- son’s over, I’d stop. I’d just not go to class. . . . I spent four years in high school, but it wasn’t until my senior year that I met with a guid- ance counselor.” Prior to his senior season, he began receiving recruiting inter- est, and would eventually sign with New Mexico. To qualify, however, he said he went to former teachers, seeking to do extra work for past courses in an attempt to raise his grades under a D.C. Public Schools provi- sion called “high school credit re- covery.” He still did not meet NCAA eligibility standards and now is at Lackawanna (Pa.) Jun- ior College. “It’s sad because these kids


have a lot of opportunities, but can’t take advantage of it,” Ballou assistant football coach Todd Amis said. “It ends up hurting the schools in the long run because [colleges] won’t recruit there any- more.”


goldenbacha@washpost.com


virus. He had been the best ath- lete in his grade school, the pitch- er and the quarterback, the fast- est runner. Then came the diag- nosis and, eventually, the transplant. Yet two years later, Erik was back on the mound, pitching. “What a day that was,” Peter Compton said. They ended up steering Erik toward golf because it would be less strenuous. They learned to deal with the medica- tion he had to take, his occa- sionally waning energy. “There’s a lot of fear in our life


“Heart transplant or not, everybody


every day that something might happen to him,” Eli Compton


tries to play.” — Compton on U.S. Open qualifying


said. “But we have learned to live with that. . . . And he just goes for it.” So after the


heart attack that precipitated his second transplant, even as he peddled away his clubs, his fami- ly figured he would return. He needed the competition. At times, he even needed a distrac- tion — golf, fishing — from the problems of his regular life. “To be honest, with Erik, every- thing is possible,” said his wife, Barbara. “He loves challenges, so there’s nothing that’s going to stop him.” This season, Compton did not earn full playing status on the PGA Tour in qualifying school, so he has played only on the kind- ness of sponsors’ exemptions. The last of those came two weeks


ago at the Memorial, Jack Nick- laus’s tournament outside Co- lumbus, Ohio. Compton made the cut by one shot, a feat in itself. Eventually, though, his condition — the reality he deals with every day — reminded him of what he has been through. His condition- ing is not what he wants it to be, and four consecutive rounds saps him of energy. He shot a final-round 82, fin- ished last among those who played the weekend, and immedi- ately thought about not playing the following day in the sectional qualifier, the 36-hole tournament that might allow him what he called his “Willy Wonka golden ticket,” a spot in the Open. “He gets so mad,” Barbara said. “I do vent,” Erik said. He got something to eat, and thought it through again. Not only would he play, he had to play. “Heart transplant or not,


everybody tries to play,” Compton said. He endured those 36 holes, and then three more in a playoff, to qualify. This week, Compton will not


just try to play, but try to compete on one on of the world’s most beautiful and famous golf cours- es. Others in the field have, no doubt, endured hardships to get here. None could possibly com- pare. “He could have really just lied down and become a victim of life,” Peter Compton said. “And he decided not to do that. He may not think he’s an inspiration to people, but I know he is.” svrlugab@washpost.com


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