A National Collegiate Athletic Assn. study of...

A National Collegiate Athletic Assn. study of 15 Division 1-A football teams during the 1987 season determined that a higher number of injuries occurred on grass fields than on synthetic surfaces, which have long been considered more dangerous.

Ursula Walsh, NCAA director of research and data processing, said the study wasn’t conclusive because it didn’t reflect all the possible cause-and-effect relationships involved in the injuries, but of the 316 injuries reported in the study, 171 occurred on natural grass and 145 on artificial surfaces.