WATCHING our basketball team fall to the University of Tennessee Sunday, one of my friends commented that it sounded like the Tennessee contingent vastly outnumbered the Virginia fans in attendance. Theories addressing this discrepancy were tossed around for a while, ranging from the respective distances (Knoxville is slightly, but only slightly, closer to Columbus than Charlottesville) to a lack of tickets given out through the SHOTS program. Two other, more legitimate reasons came to mind. One has to do with the relative size of the Universities, as the large size of the University of Tennessee means that more students ought to be willing to make the trip. Also, I think it is safe to say that schoolwork kept many Cavaliers in town this weekend. This brings to the table an interesting question: how did the Cavaliers perform in the tournament compared to schools of a similar size, and, more importantly, of similar academic caliber? The answer: well, but room for improvement remains.
Compared to schools its own size, the University achieved decent results. Tennessee has about 6,000 more undergraduate students than the University. Schools of comparable size (within 3,000 students) had a mixed performance in the tournament. Of the remaining schools in play, Oregon, UNC, USC and the University of Pittsburgh have an undergraduate enrollment similar to that of the University. Moreover, of the surviving schools, Butler, Vanderbilt and Georgetown have fewer students enrolled that the University. The fact that, of the "Sweet Sixteen," seven schools have about as many or fewer students than the University suggests that while we may have done alright for our size, we still can aim higher.
We performed better than schools of a similar academic caliber. According to U.S. News & World Report, the University ranks 24th out of all national universities and 2nd among public schools. Of the top 40 schools, 11 sent teams to the NCAA tournament this year (Penn, Duke, Vanderbilt, Notre Dame, Georgetown, the University, UNC Chapel Hill, UCLA, Wisconsin, Boston College and Georgia Tech). Among tournament-bound schools, only Penn, Duke, Vanderbilt, Notre Dame, and Georgetown beat out the University. Of the schools ranked ahead of the University academically, only Georgetown held a higher seed. And, of all schools ranked in the U.S. News and World Report's top 25 schools, only Georgetown, the University and Vanderbilt survived the first round. Duke and Penn both lost in the first round, with Duke getting upset by the 11th-seeded VCU and Penn losing to a good Texas A&M team.
Of the other teams from schools ranked in the academic top 40, only UNC and UCLA remain. They rank right behind the University, and have similar student bodies -- UNC has about 16,000; UCLA closer to 25,000. Also, both resemble our own school closely in that they are both public universities. These schools best demonstrate what the University is trying to achieve: a balanced basketball program in a quality public school with rigorous academics.
The same does not go for many of the schools left in the tournament. The teams seeded number one, all of which remain alive, average a ranking of 54.75 on the U.S. News and World Report scale. UNC sits at 27, Florida at 47, Ohio State at 57, and Kansas at 88. While all still remain within the top 100, they do not, collectively, do as good a job balancing their basketball with their books.
Another reason the University is competitive academically has to do with its high graduation rate for players. Recently, much has been made of the fact that Ohio State's freshman basketball players graduate at a rate of only 10 percent. Our recent opponent, Tennessee, has a graduation rate of only eight percent. Our athletics department, meanwhile, has a goal of graduating 100 percent of its athletes, and our men's basketball team has a respectable graduation rate of 85 percent -- good enough for the top ten of all teams in the tournament, according to a University of Central Florida study.
So, what can we glean from all this? That in the recent NCAA tournament, the University performed adequately. For a school of our size and academic caliber we did well, outperforming some of those ranked both in front of and behind us academically. We also outperformed some larger schools and out-studied some smaller ones. All in all, our performance in the tournament, while slightly disappointing, is nothing to hang our heads about, as we maintained a balance in our athletic endeavors to match our academic excellence.
Robby Colby's column appears Thursdays in The Cavalier Daily. He can be reached at rcolby@cavalierdaily.com
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