Raveling Takes a Stand Beside Thompson

George Raveling is every bit as appalled by this Proposal 42 business as his friend and colleague, John Thompson. Yet, even if the USC basketball coach disagreed strongly with the Georgetown coach on how much harm this new edict might do to their sport, to their profession and to the young people who populate it, he still would acknowledge the guts it took to walk off the job in protest, the way Thompson did the other day.

“I just don’t think there are a lot of John Thompsons out there,” Raveling said Tuesday. “Whether you agree with the man or disagree, he’s willing to stand up to the criticism that comes his way as well as the platitudes that come his way.

“In a society that tends to straddle the fence on important issues, it’s refreshing to have someone do what John did, and it’s even more admirable that his school has the kind of administrators who would be this supportive of a coach.”

They are simpatico. Raveling was the right-hand man to Thompson with the U.S. Olympic basketball team, just as he was to Bob Knight in 1984. Raveling and Thompson think many of the same thoughts. They do not think alike on everything, but they do agree on Proposal 42. They agree that it stinks.

Raveling will not be walking off the Sports Arena floor before any games, though.

“No, I think for another black coach, or rather minority coach, to do some sort of similar protest at this point would give it something of a circus atmosphere,” Raveling said. “People might lose focus on the real issue here.”

The real issue is an amendment to the National Collegiate Athletic Assn.’s original Proposition 48, passed at the organization’s recent convention, denying scholarships to students who do not meet NCAA criteria--a 2.0 grade-point average in a core curriculum and a score of 700 on the Scholastic Aptitude Test or 15 on the American College Test--tests that Raveling, for one, considers “culturally biased.”

Thompson, insisting that Proposition 48 and Proposal 42 discriminate against lower-income students who cannot control the quality of their high school educations, left the premises before last Saturday’s game between Georgetown and Boston College, as a dramatic gesture to indicate his opposition to the new rule. As of Tuesday, Thompson had not yet determined when he would return to the sidelines, although he continued to conduct Georgetown’s practices.

“I think a lot of us feel very strongly about 42, every bit as strongly as John does,” Raveling said. “I’ve been adamantly opposed to Prop. 48 from its inception, and I continue to be suspicious of anybody who comes to us as though they’re being helpful and then sets down laws that we have to pass a standardized test for success. Standardizing is just another means of keeping us in our place.”

Proposal 42 was rejected on Jan. 10, then passed in a new vote the next day. Margin of victory: 163 to 154.

“Not much of mandate,” Raveling said.

The USC coach is disgusted that the NCAA is trying to take a societal problem and turn it into an intercollegiate problem.

“This is a classic example of blaming a bad situation on the victims,” he said.

“Let me tell you something that might startle you. In 1984, the NCAA commissioned a study that revealed that had Prop. 48 existed back in 1977, 70% of the black athletes who by 1983 had graduated or were still in college studying would never have been admitted into the college in the first place.”

Raveling understands that some of those who supported Proposition 48 and Proposal 42 had their hearts in the right place. Others had other motives. Some just didn’t like the idea of larger universities loading up on high-quality, low-qualifying athletes.

For 15 years now, Raveling has been proposing other solutions. He continues to push for the elimination of freshman eligibility. Have students enroll and make them spend a game-free year amassing a cumulative grade-point average of 2.0 or greater, he says. Then give them 5 years to fulfill all their college commitments, from curricular to extracurricular.

Rather than forbidding him admission, give a kid the opportunity to succeed.

“People stand up full of righteous indignation to tell us that they’re helping, but it’s a joke,” Raveling said.

“The penalty for not meeting the requirements of Prop. 48 or (Proposal) 42 is greater than the penalty if an athlete tests positive for a drug, or accepts illegal inducements. Think about it. A kid can keep the car and money these days as long as he tells who gave it to him. (As with recent NCAA immunity rulings.) And a kid who flunks a drug test might have to sit out a year, might have to pay his own way. Whereas a Proposal 42 kid isn’t allowed into school (on scholarship), just because his education’s been lacking.

“And furthermore, as (Louisiana State Coach) Dale Brown says, they also put the mark of Cain on him. The kid has to carry around a ‘too dumb’ stigma from that day on. See what I mean about blaming the victim?”

Some will detect racist overtones here, maybe even on both sides. Raveling is not unaware of that.

“John Thompson was very smart in getting out of saying (Proposal 42) was racist. The minute that word pops out, people start running around defending themselves, saying how their friends are black, saying how their daughter’s friends are black. Then, once again, you lose sight of the real issue here.

“It took courage to do what John did. Martin Luther King said if a man hasn’t found something in his life to stand up and fight for, maybe he’s not fit to live.

“I don’t think there’s been anything that has transpired in collegiate athletics that I have found as distasteful as this,” Raveling said. “We’re tired of people hurting us by trying to help us. No more tricks.

“I’ll tell you what, if they want to give us a test on history, we’ll score 700 on it. History we know. History tells us that every time somebody tells us they’re doing us a favor, our plight worsens.”