{"id":254743,"date":"2025-09-25T23:19:10","date_gmt":"2025-09-25T23:19:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/254743\/"},"modified":"2025-09-25T23:19:10","modified_gmt":"2025-09-25T23:19:10","slug":"congress-should-step-in-and-create-some-order-for-college-sports","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/254743\/","title":{"rendered":"Congress should \u2018step in and create some order\u2019 for college sports"},"content":{"rendered":"

Big East Commissioner Val Ackerman<\/a> says the \u201cbest of college sports can survive\u201d in a tumultuous time, but only with intervention from Congress. The federal legislation known as the SCORE Act<\/a> remains in limbo in Washington.<\/p>\n

Asked if she were an optimist about the future, Ackerman said, \u201cI would be more of an optimist if Congress frankly were to do what people hope they will do and step in and create a law that would reconcile all of the federal laws that are colliding right now in the college space.\u201d<\/p>\n

During a Fireside Chat at SBJ\u2019s Game Changers Conference<\/a> in New York, Ackerman then listed some of the hurdles college sports face: Antitrust challenges. Defending lawsuits about eligibility limits. States making their own laws. She said Congress could \u201cstep in and create some order and certainty where there\u2019s not much right now.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ackerman, the first president of the WNBA, said she attended the twice-a-year Division I commissioners meetings Wednesday in Chicago for the 32 D-I conference leaders, and the talk was about the new revenue model; \u201cthe wild west nature\u201d of name, image and likeness issues; fundraising. She said it makes being a college athletic director the toughest job in sports.<\/p>\n

\u201cI tip my hat to ADs all around the country,\u201d she said. \u201cThey\u2019re really dealing with a lot right now.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ackerman noted that ADs need a more \u201cblended skillset\u201d to reflect the business realities that are part of the job beyond the traditional duties<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Asked about the increasing professionalization of the college game, she said, \u201cI do think there are models that we can pull from the pro leagues, not all of them. I don\u2019t think you can sort of drop it wholesale into the college space, but I do think there are learnings there that can be applied.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ackerman hit on a number of other topics: <\/p>\n

On the roadshow that she and other NBA executives did to convince owners to start the WNBA:<\/b> \u201cThe reaction was actually pretty receptive. And why was that? Well, because we were doing the roadshow at a time when the USA was gearing up for the Atlanta Olympics in 1996. The NBA was very much behind the preparations of that team. We were quietly supporting that in using that in effect as a laboratory, as a way to test interest, high-level interest in the best women\u2019s basketball players at that time. … There was openness because David was very persuasive, and he was the guy that had to get to the NBA owners at that time to explain to them why women were so important to the future of the game of basketball. And he did that. We knew women\u2019s college basketball was sort of cresting because the Women\u2019s Final Four at that time was really a widely anticipated event. We had the great UConn-Tennessee rivalries at that time, which were getting people excited and energized. So, we had stuff to work with. Team owners were sort of, business was good in the NBA, why not, let\u2019s take a chance on this. And so, we had the groundwork laid and the league started the summer after Atlanta.\u201d<\/p>\n

On the current WNBA:<\/b> \u201cI\u2019m thrilled to see where it is today. I mean, when we started this, the mantra really was it\u2019s going to take a generation, which is 25 years, 25 to 30 years. And I remember just spitting out the lines about it\u2019s a marathon, not a sprint. And we\u2019re hoping that the young children, boys and girls of today who are coming with their parents or their grandparents are going to be the paying customers of tomorrow. And if they\u2019re 3 today and going to a game, maybe when they\u2019re 30, they\u2019ll be buying a ticket. … There were naysayers around many corners, but we kept at it. And I really commend the NBA for sticking with it all these years. And really the payout now is just, it\u2019s great to see it, really happy for them.\u201d<\/p>\n

On her decision to leave the WNBA:<\/b> \u201cAfter 16 years at the NBA \/ WNBA, I just got tired. And my kids, I have two daughters now, 32 and 30, but they were infants really when the league started. So there I was running around, my husband was still at the firm, so we had that high-wire act that many working parents have. And so after a while, I just sort of needed a break.\u201d<\/p>\n

On becoming commissioner of the Big East:<\/b> \u201cIt just seemed like the right opportunity for me at the right time. It was in New York. It sort of mimicked, in some ways, the startup nature of the WNBA, very different startups. But the Big East was starting from scratch. The old league had all the infrastructure. So, I was saying it was like me and my iPhone starting the league, because I didn\u2019t have much else to work with in terms of staff or resources. But it was, I thought, going to be a great opportunity. … When you have an opportunity, you kind of know when it\u2019s right. And for me, that\u2019s how I felt about the Big East.\u201d<\/p>\n

On her career path:<\/b> \u201cI could never have charted my career path. And so any of you who think this is where you\u2019ll be in a year or two or five, good luck with that because I\u2019m just saying that\u2019s not really how life works. And I think what you do is you get yourself in a good position so that when certain types of opportunities come along that you think sound pretty good, like me in the Big East, for example, you\u2019re in a position to be tapped. And so, my advice to young women, especially, is embrace that journey and do a good job wherever you are along the way because your reputation will precede you.\u201d<\/p>\n

The sports industry needs to do a better job of …<\/b> \u201cI hope with everything that\u2019s going on in our country, that we as an industry don\u2019t take our eye off the importance of diversification in the leadership ranks of our business. We look at this room, my heart is soaring. As somebody who came up almost 40 years ago when there weren\u2019t many women in leadership positions, there weren\u2019t many people of color, men or women. And I look around now, and I see the progress that has been made over the last three or four decades, I don\u2019t want to see us as an industry go backward. … We\u2019ve got a lot of freedom fighters out there who are keeping their foot on the pedal as we look to make sure that the leader ranks of sports match up with our athlete populations. … I hope we can just keep doing it because that\u2019s the most important thing to me at this stage of my career.\u201d<\/p>\n

On hosting the men\u2019s and women\u2019s Final Four in the same city:<\/b> \u201cSame weekend, same city. Not this bouncing around. I think it could work. Please, colleagues in college, let\u2019s try it one time. That\u2019s all I ask.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Big East Commissioner Val Ackerman says the \u201cbest of college sports can survive\u201d in a tumultuous time, but…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":254744,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[44],"tags":[1339,43100,100591,1317,1337,1338,62,67,132,68,232,1707],"class_list":{"0":"post-254743","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ncaa-basketball","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-big-east-conference","10":"tag-game-changers","11":"tag-ncaa","12":"tag-ncaa-basketball","13":"tag-ncaabasketball","14":"tag-sports","15":"tag-united-states","16":"tag-unitedstates","17":"tag-us","18":"tag-wnba","19":"tag-womens-sports"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115267499946152324","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/254743","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=254743"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/254743\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/254744"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=254743"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=254743"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=254743"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}