Academic

Football Rules and Title IX

By Calvin Massey

  It's probably the result of watching the Super Bowl, but I have been thinking about the wisdom of returning to limited substitution rules for college football.  From about 1953 to 1965 college football played under rules that effectively prevented two-platoon football.  Today, of course, everybody is a specialist and almost nobody plays both ways.  Universities are permitted to have up to 85 players on scholarship at any one time.  That's about four times the 22 players that make up the first-string two platoons.  If limited substitution were revived the scholarship limit could be cut to 45 or 50, to maintain the same ratio of total scholarships to starters.  Because football is almost universally male, the remaining slots could be used (at universites already in compliance with Ttile IX) to bring back male sports like wrestling that have been axed to achieve Title IX compliance.  For schools struggling to comply (or not in compliance) the slots could be used to expand female sports.  And, from this fan's perspective, the change would increase competitiveness, because even schools with a tough time fielding 22 star athletes (e.g. Duke) have enough talented athletes that they might better compete with the Floridas and Oklahomas of the college football world.  It's not likely that this will happen, though. 

And, by the way, Kurt Warner didn't fumble on the next to last play in the Super Bowl.  Shame on the NFL for not reviewing the play. 

Full post as published by The Faculty Lounge on February 02, 2009 (boomark / email).