Arizona AD Dave Heeke answers College Basketball Commission recommendations

Arizona Basketball: Dave Heeke Takes On The College Basketball Commission

The University of Arizona’s athletic director Dave Heeke is not afraid to stand up and fight for what is right. The first time we saw this was when the FBI and NCAA came after his basketball coach Sean Miller after rumors swirled of being part of a “pay to play” scandal. This time, the Arizona Athletic Director Dave Heeke made sure his thoughts are clearly heard as changes are on the horizon.

Dave Heeke took the chance to address these changes when attending an event outside of McKale Center last week. Heeke was quick to acknowledge that it is time for a change in college basketball stating according to Bruce Pascoe, “I believe we’re at a point of time where we need to closely examine the sport of college basketball,” said Heeke.

With multiple changes bound to happen Dave Heeke made clear of his support of principles that he believes are the core values of the NCAA.

The first core principle that Dave Heeke was quick to support was to keep the amateur guidelines in place that prohibits students athletes receive any kind of payment. “Amateurism is important to me and there are tremendous benefits to being a student-athlete that sometimes get swept under the rug to a degree,” said Heeke. Some of the benefits that Heeke was referring too, is the college experience along with the chance to obtain a college degree from a four-year university.

Many folks feel the athletes need to be compensated more, but if the rules change or more opportunities open up to make money out of high school, then athletes would have more opportunities to make money and the NCAA option would continue as usual. But maybe they need to pay the players more for their monthly expenditures. As Luke Walton has said, he was okay with the money he got because his family was well off, but his teammates struggled.

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With the relationships between the University of Arizona and the NCAA on the rocks due to the recent FBI investigation, it was vital that Heeke made his intentions clear moving forward. By coming out publicly and making these statements, it showed that he is taking responsibility for the Arizona Athletic program and is willing to work with the NCAA to make sure issues like this do not occur again.

Heeke did not stop there. He also continued his support of the rule that allows student-athletes to receive advice from NBA agents in both high school and college then return to school. But also to extend the rule to allow undrafted players to come back to the school to continue playing.

"“I think we can create some model that allows people to explore that option to go into the draft. If it doesn’t work out, why shouldn’t we accept them back?” – Dave Heeke"

A prime example if this would be our very own Kobi Simmons or Chance Comanche last year. If the NCAA had changed the rules, they both could have entered the draft, and after not being drafted, have had the option to decide to come back to play another year at Arizona.

Rawle Alkins had a different projection. He would have been drafted last season, but maybe not as high as he would have liked. Instead, he decided, after getting feedback from NBA Execs, to come back and play his junior year at U of A. Both scenarios would be acceptable moving forward if the new recommendation was accepted.

The AD Dave Heeke also came to the support of several other rules which included a rule that would require players to stay in college for three years, to end the “One and Done Rule” also for universities to have funding for former athletes who want to finish their degree.

Finally, Heeke was also on board when it came to strict penalties for those programs which break the rules. When it comes to school presidents and AD’s Dave Heeke said that they “Cannot be permitted to turn a blind eye”. He followed that up by saying “And if we have systems in place. If we have the systems in place we can say we did everything we could to maintain the integrity of our athletic programs.” Assuming here that the NCAA “systems” are not in place so he may not support this rule retroactively.

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The University of Arizona was criticized once before for not responding quick enough when their backs against the wall, well it is fair to say that they learned their lesson. Arizona’s newish Athletic Director was not about to look like he was making a mistake in keeping Miller after Emmanuel Richardson was indicted. Waiting proved to be beneficial, allowing players and coach Miller to finish out the season, even though several ESPN broadcasters called for his firing. It was a solid decision. Dave Heeke also wants a better system in place to keep the NCAA out of the turmoil in the future, and we applaud that effort.