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PACIFIC-12 CONFERENCE MENS' MEDIA DAYOctober 23, 2014Larry ScottLOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA THE MODERATOR: I'd like to introduce PAC‑12 commissioner Larry Scott. COMMISSIONER SCOTT: Good morning, everyone. As you can tell from the video, there's an awful lot of excitement about PAC‑12 basketball this year, a lot of great storylines. Let me start by welcoming you to the PAC‑12 offices, our new arena here. Also appreciate everything you do to cover PAC‑12 basketball during the season. I want to extend a special welcome to three new coaches to our league, Cuonzo Martin from Cal, Ernie Kent from Washington State, and Wayne Tinkle from Oregon State. It's going to be a lot of fun to see what these three great coaches bring to their programs, part of a lot of exciting storylines we have this year. I also enjoy welcoming our student‑athletes to this stage. It's fun to interact with them. They don't get to do this very often. The student‑athletes with us today are a great example of not only very talented basketball players, but what they do on their campuses. We have some of the best and brightest with us today. I'd like to briefly discuss PAC‑12 basketball, our outlook for the season, speak to you about some of the off‑court issues going on today, some of the milestones we're reaching as a conference. Exciting year for the PAC‑12. A lot of momentum in basketball. Each of the last two years, five and six teams respectively making the NCAA tournament. The trajectory of the conference is going in just the right direction. Of course, last season we had a record eight teams with 20 wins. None of our teams had a losing record at home. The depth and competitiveness of this conference is really on the rise. Once making the tournament, we had a lot of success last year. Our teams that made the NCAA tournament proved their worth highlighted by Arizona, UCLA, and Stanford making the Sweet 16, and of course Arizona making the Elite 8. The success of PAC‑12 basketball is going to continue. Stocked with a lot of new talent, an indication of the talent in this conference, the PAC‑12 had the most NBA draft choices this past season with nine, more than any other conference. It gives you a sense of the talent and depth at this level and the next level as well. There's so much exciting basketball ahead of us. Last year, in addition to the strong regular season, the depth of competition, we enjoyed a great end of the PAC‑12 regular season with our PAC‑12 men's basketball championships in Las Vegas. It was the second year of a three‑year agreement. We reached a new milestone last year with four of the sessions being sold out, delighted with the atmosphere for our student‑athletes, our programs, our fans. That's set to continue. We're going to our third year of our agreement this year and we'll be talking to our friends in Las Vegas about the future. This year one of the new features is extending our relationship with New York Life that came in as presenting sponsor for the men's basketball tournament last year. We've extended our partnership and it's going to include the women's basketball tournament in Seattle, as well, which we're delighted with. Everything we're able to do for our student‑athletes and fans around the tournament has a lot to do with the support we get from our broadcast partners and sponsors like New York Life. Our broadcast partners are a critical factor in the success of the PAC‑12. Not only do we have great coaches, improved facilities, great recruits, but more of the country is getting to see more PAC‑12 basketball than they've ever seen before. The exposure of PAC‑12 men's basketball is really unprecedented. This year there will be 44 games on the ESPN family of networks, 22 games on FOX networks, two games on CBS, and 147 games on the PAC‑12 network. Every men's basketball game held at one of our campuses is going to be telecast and available nationally. In addition to the live broadcast, we have an unprecedented amount of studio programming going on around basketball, features, which is what our vision was. This would be the go‑to place for 360 degree coverage of our fans' favorite teams. This year it's going to come to life with new feature programming we're doing, taking a concept that's worked incredibly well in football, The Drive, behind the scenes look at our programs, on campus, practice, behind the curtains type of coverage. We're extending that to the basketball season this year. The Drive is a show that will go behind the scenes with all 12 teams during the season. The idea is to bring fans closer to the action, get to know the coaches and student‑athletes. We've gotten a great reaction to this type of programming, which is really the hallmark of why the conference network exists and the types of things that we can do. Another very interesting development this past year was the first‑ever PAC‑12 men's basketball All‑Star team that went to China, under the direction of Larry Krystkowiak. We had great student‑athletes from our schools play against Chinese university teams and professional teams in China. The student‑athlete experience was incredible. The sight‑seeing they were able to do in Beijing and Shanghai, some of the other towns they visited, was terrific. There was an academic delegation that came with them, held high‑level meeting with academic administrators and government officials over there. Our division for the development of the PAC‑12 brand, our schools' brand in China is really starting to develop. The next big leap will involve basketball. In November 2015, we'll be the first league ever, professional or collegiate, to host a regular‑season game in China when the University of Washington takes on the University of Texas for the opening tip‑off game in November of 2015 in Shanghai. This is going to be a fantastic breakthrough event that we'll support with academic initiatives. Should be an amazing experience for the student‑athletes, but a great opportunity for alumni and broadening the reach of our universities in China. Beyond what's happening on the court and around the sport of basketball, a lot happening in intercollegiate athletics generally and specifically around reform. Recently, of course, five conferences have been granted autonomy to propose legislation as a group of five or individually in areas that would benefit student‑athletes. This is an opportunity that the PAC‑12 is pursuing with great relish. Our presidents put out a letter to our colleagues in the four largest conferences in spring outlining a new agenda for things we wanted to do. Now we have the opportunity to start acting on some of those things. You would have seen the notice we put out October 1st, the first date we could notice our intentions, outlining the areas where we intend to provide greater benefits for our 7,000 student‑athletes in our conference. Those things include increasing the value of scholarships to cover the full cost of attendance, guaranteeing scholarships, providing for continuing education so student‑athletes that are under scholarship can finish their degrees if they leave school and want to come back and have those costs covered, and improved medical expenses and coverage for any injuries incurred as student‑athletes. On top of that, we're working on a national level as well as a conference level on more involvement for student‑athletes in the governance process. This is a very dynamic time, important time. I certainly felt that progressive and significant reform is possible within the current structure. Now with some of the flexibility that's been afforded by the NCAA to the five conferences to act collectively or individually, I think you'll start to see some meaningful and concrete decisions taken in our conference starting next week. We've had meetings over the last month, meeting outlining some of the changes that we've intended to make, working with them on some of the specifics. Next week we meet with the board of directors, presidents and chancellors of our universities proposing that we enact some of the proposals I outlined here this morning. I think you can expect some concrete news coming from us next week. I believe this is representing an important new day for student‑athletes in our conference as well as nationally. Thank you for being here today. I know we have a full slate of coaches and student‑athletes up here talking to you. But I think we have a few minutes to answer any questions that you have. I'm happy to take them now or throughout the day. Q. Do you have an estimate of how much it's going to cost each school to provide the full scholarship benefits that we're talking about? COMMISSIONER SCOTT: Yes, we do have a good idea. Been working closely with our schools. I think the important thing to underscore is the costs to fully implement everything will be different at every school. The gap between the current aid and full cost of attendance is different on every campus. The cost of attendance is something determined by each university, each university's financial aid office. It's verified by the Federal Government. That gap is different. If you're looking for a general estimate, it could change from something like $2,000 to $5,000 per student‑athlete. That's about the range I've seen in working with our campuses in terms of what that delta would be that would now be covered under the cost of attendance. Some of the other things we're proposing in terms of medical expenses, those will represent additional costs, as well as some of the food policies that have recently been changed. Obviously our schools will comply with any of the rulings from any of the court orders if those are not overturned on appeal. It's hard to pinpoint exactly what the costs will be for student‑athletes because some things are still unresolved. Q. Where do things stand in relation to DIRECTV? COMMISSIONER SCOTT: No new news in terms of our discussions with DIRECTV. They're not engaging in any negotiations or discussions with us at the moment, which I know is frustrating for our fans and us. We're hopeful that they change their mind, especially when they see the slate of amazing basketball games that we have. I think every school will have their home opener on the PAC‑12 networks, every school will be involved in high‑profile games, the men's basketball tournament in Las Vegas will be on the network. We hope this is something they decide they don't want to deprive their customers of anymore. Beyond that, we're monitoring very closely DIRECTV's proposed sale to AT&T. If that happens, that will kick off new discussions with a new parent. A parent we have a very good relationship with. AT&T is amongst our most significant partners, they carry the PAC‑12 networks on U‑verse. They're the official telecommunications sponsor of each of our 12 schools as well as the PAC‑12 conference. A lot will change over the next year. I'm hopeful this is something we'll be able to provide to our fans. Q. How will the proposal with the board next week differ at all from what we've seen in previous releases? COMMISSIONER SCOTT: What you've seen from us so far in the letter our presidents and chancellors put out in the spring, then what we put out October 1st, was our intentions, what we plan to do. The significance of October 1st was according to the NCAA autonomy rule change, that was the date for us to indicate what we're planning to do either individually as conferences or as a group of five collectively. On the first date available we put out our intentions to act in the areas that I described today. The significance for our meeting next week with our presidents and chancellors is we have the opportunity to start formally enacting some of these things. To move from intention to action, I think that will be the significance of what we talk about next week coming out of the meetings. What we're deciding to do as schools individually as a PAC‑12 conference and what we are going to be formally proposing as a group of five. The picture needs to become more clear about exactly what's going to happen and when. Thank you for being here today. Look forward to seeing you all later. FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports |
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