College Basketball

The NCAA’s Management Council, with 52 members from Division I schools and athletic conferences, meets today and Tuesday in Indianapolis to vote on proposals aimed at improving academic performance and graduation rates among student-athletes playing Division I basketball.

“We need to come to some conclusion on salient provisions that would send the right message about academics and athletics, special legislation to get at specific problems in Division I basketball,” said Clarence Doninger, Indiana athletic director, one of three Big Ten representatives on the panel.

The major proposals for change include: tying the number of scholarships to a school’s four-year graduation rate of players; limiting to four the number of initial scholarships a school can award each year; changing the recruiting calendar to reduce or eliminate summer recruiting; and encourage all entering players (freshmen and transfers) to attend summer sessions before their first fall term to acclimate them to academic demands.

Coach Dick Bennett will return to Wisconsin next season, trying to build on the Badgers’ surprising run to the Final Four this season.

Bennett spent last week considering retirement after Wisconsin lost, 53-41, to national champion Michigan State in the NCAA semifinals. But while taping his weekly television show, which aired on WISC-TV in Madison on Sunday, Bennett confirmed his desire to return for a sixth season.

Supporters of Bob Knight rallied in Bloomington, Ind., to denounce media coverage of the Indiana coach, who is accused of choking and hitting former players.

The rally outside IU’s Assembly Hall was organized by Mike Pegram, who runs a Web site devoted to Indiana University sports. A recent message on the site spawned a group called Fans and Friends in Support of Coach Knight.

Dennis Nutt, the assistant basketball coach at Arkansas State, will become Southwest Texas State’s head coach, Little Rock’s KATV-TV reported. Nutt will replace Mike Miller, who resigned March 20 to become an assistant at Kansas State. Nutt’s three brothers also are coaches. Houston Nutt is Arkansas’ football coach, Danny Nutt is an assistant football coach at Arkansas, and Dickey Nutt is Arkansas State’s basketball coach.

Miscellany

Canada beat the United States, 3-2, on Nancy Drolet’s overtime goal in the women’s world hockey championship game at Mississauga, Canada.

Canada, which trailed 2-0 in the second period, has won six world championships, but lost to the United States in the gold-medal game in the 1998 Olympics.

The entire British team going to the Sydney Olympics will be drug-tested in advance to avoid any doping scandals, the London Observer reported.

The newspaper said that half the British contingent of 350 will be tested by UK Sport before they leave for Australia and the others will provide samples when they arrive.

The arbitration panel set to rule on Javier Sotomayor’s drug case in Monte Carlo has adjourned until June 2.

The world high jump record-holder from Cuba is appealing an International Amateur Athletic Federation suspension imposed after he tested positive for cocaine at last summer’s Pan American Games in Winnipeg.

Carla Overbeck, captain of the U.S. women’s soccer team, is being treated for Graves’ disease, a condition caused by an overactive thyroid gland.

She is expected to make a full recovery and be available for the Olympic team, which has yet to be selected for September’s Sydney Games.

Lecky Haller and Matt Taylor had a flawless final run to win the men’s doubles canoe title in the U.S. Canoe/Kayak Slalom Olympic trials at Ocoee River, Tenn.

Playing on a school field because Eritrea’s national soccer stadium is being repaired, visiting Nigeria was held to a scoreless tie at Asmara in its opening qualifier for the 2002 World Cup.

At Maseru, Shaun Bartlett and Jabu Pale scored to lead visiting South Africa to a 2-0 win over Lesotho. At Banjul, Gambia, Bouchaib Lembarki scored in the 63rd minute to give Morocco a 1-0 victory.

Moacir Barbosa, the goalkeeper blamed for Brazil’s loss to Uruguay in the 1950 World Cup final, died at 79 in Sao Paulo, Brazil from general organ failure, liver and kidney problems.