[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 64 (Thursday, April 6, 1995)]
[Senate]
[Pages S5383-S5387]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


 CONGRATULATING THE UCONN HUSKIES ON THEIR NCAA NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP 
                                VICTORY

  Mr. DODD. Mr. President, on Sunday, April 2, the University of 
Connecticut Huskies made history by becoming the second women's 
basketball team ever to finish an NCAA season undefeated and win a 
national championship. The Huskies' dramatic 70-64 come-from-behind 
defeat of the Tennessee Volunteers brought their final season record to 
35-0, the best finish by any team--men's or women's--in the history of 
NCAA basketball.
  On behalf of the citizen's of Connecticut, I rise to congratulate and 
thank this remarkable group of young women.
  Those who watched the game on Sunday afternoon may recall that as the 
Huskies celebrated their victory, the UConn pep band played Aretha 
Franklin's hit song, ``Respect.'' Mr. President, there simply could not 
have been a more appropriate accompaniment for this long-awaited 
celebration. Perhaps as much as any sports team in recent memory, the 
UConn women's basketball team has generated the respect and admiration 
of all who have had the privilege of watching them play. In so doing, 
they have reminded the citizens of Connecticut, as well as people 
throughout the country, what college athletics is all about.
  The Huskies' list of accomplishments on the court is nothing short of 
amazing. On their way to the NCAA title, they broke 14 NCAA records, 
including most victories, longest winning streak, most points, most 
points in a game and largest margin of victory. In addition, four 
Connecticut players--Rebecca Lobo, Jen Rizzotti, Kara Walters and 
Jamelle Elliott--were named to the all-tournament team. That is the 
first time in history that four players from the same team have 
received this honor. [[Page S5384]] 
  No less impressive than their basketball heroics are the Huskies' 
accomplishments off the court. Rebecca Lobo, winner of numerous 
individual basketball honors awarded by the NCAA and the Big East 
Conference this year, has maintained a near-perfect grade point average 
as a political science major and was a finalist for the prestigious 
Rhodes Scholarship. Last semester, seven of the 12 Husky players were 
named to the University's dean's list.
  What has touched basketball fans throughout the country more than 
anything else, however, are those qualities exhibited by the Huskies 
that cannot be measured by grade point averages, records or point 
tallies. Anyone who saw the team play this year was struck by their 
tremendous enthusiasm for the game of basketball, their unwavering 
commitment to fair play and good sportsmanship and their obvious 
dedication to and respect for one another and their coaches.
  In this era of season-ending strikes, multi-million dollar contract 
disputes, recruiting scandals and low athlete graduation rates, this 
group of women has reminded us that the term, ``student-athlete'', is 
not just a catch-phrase for college brochures. It is an attainable 
ideal to which all college athletes should aspire, and it is what makes 
collegiate athletics so special.
  Mr. President, it is also important to recognize what this remarkable 
group of young women has done for women's college athletics. This year, 
on average, roughly 8,000 people attended the women's home games at 
Gampel Pavilion, which represents a 485 percent increase over the 
average crowd size during their 1991 Final Four season. Young girls, 
with their hair braided like Rebecca Lobo or wearing replicas of Jen 
Rizzotti's number 21 jersey, watched the team play on national 
television. Autograph seekers mobbed the players before and after 
games, and the players' mailboxes were literally flooded with letters 
from fans and well-wishers.
  People of all ages in Connecticut and throughout the nation caught 
wind of ``Husky-mania'' and demonstrated that women's athletics could 
generate every bit as much enthusiasm and spectator support as men's. 
Nationwide, total attendance for women's college basketball games has 
skyrocketed from 1.3 million in 1984 to 3.6 million in 1995.
  As we look back on this spectacular season of women's college 
basketball, it is important that we note just how far collegiate 
athletic programs for women have come. Once little more than small, 
poorly-funded intramural organizations, women's collegiate athletic 
teams have begun to enjoy the same status as the men's teams. This is 
due in part to Title IX of the Equal Education Amendment Act, the 1972 
legislation that guarantees women equal opportunity in all scholastic 
pursuits--including sports--at schools that receive federal funding.
  Although disparities and inequities between men's and women's 
programs persist, it is clear that this law has forced colleges and 
universities to re-examine how they allocate resources. The law has 
helped ensure that scholarship money is available for women like 
Rebecca Lobo, Pam Webber, Kara Wolters or Jamelle Elliott and that the 
coaching and facilities provided to female athletes allow them to 
develop their talents to the fullest.
  While it is true that we may look upon the Huskies' success as 
positive evidence of Title IX at work, it is also true that their 
accomplishments underscore the need for further progress in this area. 
Not all schools have made efforts to improve their women's athletic 
programs, and many of those that have made significant progress have 
yet to fully comply with Title IX.
  What is clear, however, is that the American people, as evidenced by 
the immense popularity of the UConn women's basketball team, are ready 
and willing to lend their enthusiastic support to women's collegiate 
athletics.
  Mr. President, when the Huskies traveled to Washington earlier this 
year, they waited in line outside a White House gate only to be told 
that a scheduling mistake made it impossible for them to get inside. On 
Sunday, after having won the national championship, Head Coach Geno 
Auriemma spoke with President Clinton on the phone and pointed out that 
perhaps the next time his team traveled to Washington, his players 
could enter the White House through the front door.
  The President has honored his request.
  Mr. President, when the Huskies walk through the front door of the 
White House, they will not only experience a great honor, but will also 
help ensure that the door remains open for future generations of female 
athletes.
  In closing, Mr. President, I want to mention the names of all the 
UConn players and coaches who contributed to the 1995 undefeated title 
campaign: Geno Auriemma (Head Coach), Chris Dailey (Assistant Coach), 
Tonya Cardoza (Assistant Coach), Meghan Pattyson (Assistant Coach), 
Carla Berube, Kim Better, Jamelle Elliott, Jill Gelfenbien, Kelley 
Hunt, Rebecca Lobo, Brenda Marquis, Jen Rizzotti, Missy Rose, Nykesha 
Sales, Pam Webber and Kara Wolters.
  I also ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record an article 
by Owen Canfield that recently appeared in the Hartford Courant, as 
well as a 1992 editorial by Greg Garber, Lori Riley and Woody Anderson 
that was also printed in the Hartford Courant.
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

               [From the Hartford Courant, Apr. 3, 1995]

                     The best: It's pure and Simple

                           (By Owen Canfield)

       Minneapolis--Glory. Really. What a brave bunch, this UConn 
     women's basketball team, and a fighting bunch.
       The NCAA Division I women's college basketball championship 
     flag will fly over the state university in Storrs. They 
     should haul it down and have it dry-cleaned every day just to 
     preserve the purity of the memorable season that ended with a 
     surging, 70-64 victory over Tennessee at the Target Center.
       The Huskies wound up 35-0. That's pure.
       Hey, Connecticut, let's have a parade. Bet you already have 
     started planning back there? Wait for us, we who traveled 
     here to watch. We'll be home today.
       UConn won all the easy ones this year, and then it won the 
     toughest game imaginable, under the most trying, challenging 
     conditions.
       This was the time for it. Put it down as one of the more 
     dramatic and gutty performances in the state's sports 
     history.
       ``No way they can do it now,'' a pessimist said after 
     Rebecca Lobo picked up her third personal foul and had to go 
     to the bench to sit out more than 11 minutes of the first 
     half. Then it was Jen Rizzotti, then Nykesha Sales with three 
     personals. And Kara Wolters with two before the half ended. 
     UConn had to alter its game and its personnel. Emboldened, 
     the Volunteers went up by one, by three, by five, by six.
       ``No way,'' Joe Pessimist said. ``It's over.''
       It wasn't over. It hadn't even started, friends. But you 
     know that. You saw it, right?
       Say it slowly and savor it: Connecticut is the national 
     champion in women's basketball.
       ``More wins [35],'' said Nykesha Sales, the 18-year-old 
     freshman who scored 10 points, ``than I won in my whole 
     [Bloomfield] high school career. Gosh. A perfect season.''
       Yes sir. A perfect season. The last word.
       Players on both teams cried at the end. It always happens. 
     There are winners' tears and losers' tears. But these 
     winners' tears were different because . . . well, can you 
     picture Jamelle Elliott crying over anything? She is the 
     toughest person on the team, maybe the toughest in all of 
     women's basketball while the game is in progress. But when 
     this game ended, while Rebecca Lobo ran in a wide semicircle 
     with her hand in the air and the ultimate triumph on her 
     lips, Elliott stood flatfooted in one spot on the court and 
     did a little public bawling.
       Well, this was the time for it. There were no more games to 
     win, no more criticism to answer and no more people to fling 
     doubts.
       Win one like this and the job is finished. Time now to be 
     human and celebrate not only with cheers and hugs and high-
     fives, but celebrate within yourself. That's what Elliott was 
     doing, having a happy, moving little private party inside. 
     Expressing love for her teammates is what she was doing.
       She was celebrating the perfect season the perfect way.
       The losers' tears were not bitter ones, though this was a 
     bitter loss for Tennessee because, as Carla Berube said, ``We 
     gave them everything they could have wanted. Maybe we wanted 
     it more.''
       Berube, the wiry reserve who, like Sales, simply had to 
     make the plays this day because at times there was no one 
     else, wore a cap that said ``National Champions'' in bold 
     blue across the front. She sat in a chair in the locker room, 
     cool as ice, but her eyes were dancing.
       ``You are not as big as those Tennessee kids,'' a man said. 
     ``Tiffani Johnson, Vonda Ward, Abby Conklin, Dana Johnson . . 
     . [[Page S5385]] they're a lot bigger. And they're athletes. 
     But you got some rebounds [three] and you played some 
     defense. You were tough.''
       ``I'd better be tough,'' Berube said. ``I practice against 
     Rebecca Lobo and Jamelle Elliott every day. I'd better be.''
       Referee Dee Kantner is said to be one of the best in the 
     business, but it appeared to Connecticut people she was 
     calling them a little too close. UConn does not have the 
     depth of Tennessee, and coach Geno Auriemma had to improvise 
     as never before after Lobo, Wolters and Rizzotti all got in 
     first-half foul trouble. At time all three were on the bench, 
     which meant that the responsibility fell to Berube, the soph, 
     and Sales, the frosh.
       Did you say tough?
       ``I think I got rid of my nervousness in the last game,'' 
     Sales said. She didn't have to mention it. She did amazing 
     things with the ball, made some astonishing championship 
     moves to the hoop, and played 33 minutes because the team 
     needed her.
       ``Today I started off well and that's always good,'' Sales 
     said. ``Coach hasn't said anything to me [after a weak 
     showing against Stanford]. He never puts the pressure on 
     me.''
       There was pressure enough in this game to buckle an old 
     colonel going under fire for the thousandth time. But these 
     UConn women didn't budge.
       So, you go ahead and arrange the parade. The whole state 
     will come. And let's have Rebecca ride in the lead limousine 
     and be governor for a day. She's a straight-A political 
     science major, you know.
       But wait for us, will you?
       Glory, what a story.
                                                                    ____


               [From the Hartford Courant, May 24, 1992]

                 Women's Progress in College Athletics

            (By Greg Garber, Lori Riley and Woody Anderson)

       When Jaymie Hyde arrived at the University of New Hampshire 
     four years ago, she looked past the cracked public tennis 
     courts, the 15-year-old uniforms that didn't fit, and the 
     lack of scholarships. She was just happy to play tennis.
       Then, last July, New Hampshire took that away, too.
       After the shock of the program's elimination wore off, Hyde 
     did something about it. Like so many young female athletes, 
     Hyde, 21 of Essex, had never heard of Title IX of the Equal 
     Education Amendment Act, the law that gave women equal 
     opportunity in all scholastic pursuits, including sports, at 
     schools that receive federal funds.
       She learned quickly.
       Led by Hyde and her mother, the 11 women's tennis team 
     members hired Washington attorney Arthur Bryant and 
     threatened to sue the Durham University. After all, the 
     school's budget cuts didn't affect the men's tennis team.
       The university capitulated. The two parties reached an out-
     of-court settlement March 12. New Hampshire reinstated the 
     team and agreed to implement a five-year plan to upgrade its 
     women's athletic program.
       ``I hope from this whole thing that everybody else realizes 
     that you don't have to sit around and let it happen,'' Hyde 
     said. ``We didn't know about Title IX, which is kind of 
     funny. I sort of felt stupid.''
       Title IX marks its 20th anniversary next month. With regard 
     to sports, the law insists that the ratio of male and female 
     athletes be proportional to that of the student body.
       Though some progress has been made, women in college 
     athletics are still struggling for equality nationally and in 
     Connecticut. And with many colleges now hard-pressed 
     economically, women's programs seem unlikely to expand in the 
     '90s.
       ``In the '70s and '80s, women's athletics 
     expanded and left us with extravagant expectations,'' said 
     Judith A. Davidson, athletic director at Central Connecticut 
     State University in New Britain. ``Now we're in 
     retrenchment.''
       And yet, women are curiously quiet. Although men outnumber 
     women in collegiate athletics by about 2-to-1 in Connecticut, 
     the federal agency responsible for enforcing Title IX has 
     received no complaints about the state's schools in the last 
     two years. Nationally, in two years, the agency has received 
     only 20 college complaints.
       Many in college athletics do not understand their rights. 
     And many are not as willing as Jaymie Hyde to fight for them. 
     Some fear reprisals from those in charge.
       Nationally, women collegiate athletes are also outnumbered 
     2-to-1. Some say that is not because of a lack of 
     opportunity, but a lack of interest.
       ``I think every male and female athlete on campus should 
     have the same opportunities,'' said Carolyn Vanacore, a 
     former physical education department chairwoman and professor 
     emeritus at Southern Connecticut State University in New 
     Haven. ``But there do not appear to be as many women 
     interested in sports as men.''
       Others argue that lack of women doesn't necessarily mean 
     lack of interest.
       ``For years, athletic departments have contended that women 
     just don't want to play sports in the numbers that men do,'' 
     said Lyn St. James, the president of the New York-based 
     Women's Sports Foundation, a non-profit organization 
     dedicated to promoting and enhancing sports for girls and 
     women.
       ``They say, because of football, there will be more men 
     playing sports than women. Perhaps there may always be a few 
     more male athletes than females, but the kind of disparity 
     that we now see--a 70-30 ratio in Division I schools--is due 
     to a denial of opportunities rather than a lack of 
     interest.''
       What happened at Washington State University supports the 
     point. After the school was found in violation of Title IX, 
     it added women's soccer and crew teams. As a result, the 
     percentage of women athletes increased from 29 to 44.
       ``If the opportunities are there,'' St. James says, ``women 
     will play.''
       In compliance or not? Title IX is so complex and unwieldy--
     there are 14 major criteria to judge whether a school is in 
     compliance--that it took 16 years of debate and lawsuits to 
     define the law so it could be enforced. The Office of Civil 
     Rights (OCR) is responsible for enforcing Title IX, and there 
     is sharp disagreement over whether it has done its job.
       ``We had a chance to move into a period of permanent 
     equity,'' said Jeff Orleans, who helped write Title IX as a 
     lawyer in the Civil Rights Division of the U.S. General 
     Counsel's Office. ``But there was no federal leadership for 
     the colleges. It was disappointing that there wasn't [OCR] 
     enforcement.''
       Most of Connecticut's colleges and universities say they 
     think they are in compliance with the law, but no one is 
     sure.
       At the state's 18 four-year colleges, male athletes 
     outnumber female athletes almost two to one, 3,975 to 2,089. 
     Yet full-time female undergradutes outnumber males by almost 
     2,500.
       At only two Connecticut schools--the University of 
     Bridgeport and the U.S. Coast Guard Academy in New London--is 
     the number of women athletes in proportion to the number of 
     students.
       In the state's worst case, female students outnumber males 
     at Sacred Heart University in Fairfield. Yet, its 40 female 
     athletes are outnumbered by male athletes by more than 5-to-
     1.
       Double standards? Clearly, there are disparities large and 
     small.
       At the University of Connecticut, male athletes always have 
     been given jockstraps as a matter of courses. Not until 1990 
     were female athletes given sports bras. At most other 
     Connecticut schools, men are given jockstraps, but women buy 
     their own athletic bras.
       At Quinnipiac College in Hamden, the men's basketball coach 
     is a full-time employee; the women's basketball coach is part 
     time. It is the same with the track program at Central 
     Connecticut State University.
       At Yale University's ancient Payne Whitney Gymnasium, women 
     athletes still walk into women's bathrooms and see urinals, 
     leftovers from Yale's pre-coed days.
       This year at Central, the football and men's basketball 
     teams traveled to games in buses with hired drivers, while 
     coaches drove all other sports teams in vans.
       These slights hint at larger imbalances.
       A recent National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) 
     study shows that:
       The average Division I school spends $849,000 on 
     scholarships for male athletes and only $373,000 for women.
       Division I schools spend nearly five times more recruiting 
     male athletes than women athletes. Much of the spending is 
     for recruiters' and recruits' travel.
       Division I schools spent nearly 3\1/2\ times more on men's 
     sports than on women's.
       Closing the gap? ``Gender equity: It's the hot topic of the 
     90s,'' UConn athletic director Lew Perkins said. 
     ``Everybody's just beginning to talk about it. I'll be 
     honest, like many schools we don't fully understand it. 
     That's why we're studying it. We need to find out where we 
     are.''
       Even armed with the thick title IX manual and a battery of 
     lawyers, schools have found that is not easy.
       For example, if numbers are awry, but a university 
     determines by studies and surveys that there is no interest 
     in a particular sport on campus, then the
      school may still be in compliance.
       About seven years ago, a women's softball club was formed 
     at Connecticut College. Last spring, the 30-member club 
     petitioned for varsity status. The proposal was approved by 
     the student advisory board but was turned down by the 
     administration. Athletic director Charles Luce said lack of 
     space on campus for a softball field was the main reason. The 
     club pays to play at a public field in Groton.
       Luce, who is retiring this summer, said the school does not 
     discriminate against women athletes. There are more women's 
     teams (12) than men's (11), but 18 fewer women athletes than 
     men, and 240 more women students than men overall.
       Does this put Connecticut College out of compliance with 
     Title IX? Luce, who wasn't sure what the participation 
     numbers were, doesn't think so. ``We try to bend over 
     backward to make sure we don't'' discriminate.
       Under Title IX, lack of facilities or money are not 
     acceptable reasons for not adding a women's sport when there 
     is interest and women are underrepresented.
       Kathryn Reith, director of communications and advocacy at 
     the Women's Sports Foundation, said the school's decision on 
     softball ``could be a violation.'' Reith recently produced a 
     Title IX guide, ``Playing Fair,'' for high school and college 
     sports. ``They have more than enough players, a demonstrated 
     interest. The school should add the team.''
       Terry Perreault, a junior softball captain, didn't 
     understand how Title IX could help [[Page S5386]] her club 
     become a varsity sport. Her coach, Deana Kiefer, doesn't want 
     to challenge Connecticut College's administration.
       ``I think if we keep petitioning, we'll get it sooner or 
     later,'' Kiefer said. ``I'm not going to go sue for it; what 
     are my chances of being the varsity coach if I did?'' What is 
     compliance? There are other factors by which compliance is 
     measured, including the amount and quality of equipment, 
     locker rooms, practice facilities and playing fields.
       When assessing compliance, an overall comparison must be 
     made between men's and women's programs. For example, if an 
     assistant coach is provided for the men's basketball team and 
     not the women's, a school could still be in compliance if 
     another men's team did not have an assistant coach.
       At the team level, comparisons of similar sports, such as 
     baseball and softball, are also valid, even if the program is 
     balanced overall. So, if the baseball team travels by 
     airplane and the softball team uses a van, that could be a 
     violation, depending on the distance traveled.
       When University of New Hampshire administrators eliminated 
     women's tennis, they believed they were still in compliance 
     because they also cut men's wrestling. But when the tennis 
     team threatened to sue, the OCR informed the school that they 
     were out of compliance. Since women were already 
     underrepresented in athletics, cutting one sport for each sex 
     maintained the disparity.
       At Yale, 36.3 percent of all athletes are women, based on 
     the team rosters, while 44.2 percent of Yale's undergraduates 
     are women.
       Yet Barbara Chesler, Yale's associate athletic director, 
     said her sports program would have been in compliance even if 
     women's ice hockey had been cut, as was rumored last spring.
       Members of the ice hockey team's alumni association and 
     parent support groups contemplated suing the university if 
     their team was eliminated. After consulting with the OCR, 
     Yale cut men's water polo and wrestling instead.
       College administrators often say, ``If you don't count 
     football, we're fairly equitable.'' Before Title IX took 
     effect, the NCAA unsuccessfully tried to exclude football 
     from the legislation.
       Title IX makes no distinction between revenue-producing 
     sports, such as basketball and football, and non-revenue 
     sports such as cross country and swimming.
       But if football is removed, more men than women still 
     participate in sports at most schools. The University of New 
     Haven, for example has 147 male athletes and only 46 female 
     athletes even when the football team isn't counted.
       That means men athletes would outnumber women athletes by 
     3-to-1 although they outnumber women only 2-to-1 in the 
     student body.
       ``If we're out of whack there, we're out of whack in the 
     other areas,'' said Debbie Chin, New Haven's associate 
     athletic director. ``I take the blame for this.''
       Glass ceiling drops while women are underrepresented as 
     athletes, the situation with coaches and athletic program 
     administrators is worse. While about one of every three 
     college athletes is a woman, less than one of every four 
     college coaches is a woman. And only one of every 17 athletic 
     directors is a woman.
       Title IX does not say anything about the hiring of women 
     coaches or administrators; ironically, it has led to a 
     decrease in the number of women in coaching. Only 65 of 139 
     women's teams in the state are coached by women. Nearly all 
     women's teams were coached by women before Title IX. But when 
     the visibility and pay increased, so did men's interest in 
     applying for the jobs.
       Fifteen of the state's 18 schools have male athletic 
     directors. Nationally, there are only 57 women directors 
     among the 860 coed college athletic departments.
       ``The glass ceiling in the gymnasium appears to be even 
     lower than in the nation's business office,'' said Brooklyn 
     College physical education professor Vivian Acosta, a leading 
     authority on women in sports. ``In athletics, it appears that 
     women are being carved out of the work force.''
       Six years ago, UConn associate athletic director Pat 
     Meiser-McKnett found herself discussing the vacant athletic 
     director's job at Virginia Commonwealth University in 
     Richmond with the school's president at the NCAA convention. 
     The conversation took place in a hotel lobby and lasted less 
     than 30 minutes.
      Meiser-McKnett submitted a three-page letter to VCU, but was 
     not formally interviewed.
       Months later, Meiser-McKnett was stunned to read in The 
     Courant that she was one of three finalists for the job.
       ``I was furious,'' Meiser-McKnett said. ``It was so absurd. 
     They were suing me to fill the slot--I was the token 
     female.''
       VCU officials say they did not release Meiser-McKnett's 
     name as a finalist. However, John Packett, a reporter at the 
     Richmond Times-Dispatch, says he got his information from a 
     university source.
       It was, Meiser-McKnett says, the Old-Boy network at work. 
     According to a 1988 Brooklyn College study by Acosta and 
     fellow professor Linda Jean Carpenter, the Old-Boy network--
     made up of males in power who aren't willing to recognize 
     women as equals--is the main reason women don't get hired by 
     athletic departments. As a rule, men have been in power 
     longer and there are vastly more of them.
       ``Who do they look [to hire]?'' said Linda Wooster, 
     director of women's athletics at Quinnipiac. ``People not 
     posing a threat, people they're comfortable with. It's 
     frustrating sometimes.''
       In the Ivy League, all eight athletic directors are men. 
     Meanwhile, 13 of the 28 associate athletic directors are 
     women. Recently, Columbia University in New York had the 
     chance to break up the male monopoly.
       ``I was approached last year by a search firm about the 
     AD's job at Columbia,'' said Davidson, Central's athletic 
     director. ``The four finalists were two women [including 
     Davidson] and two minority men. And then, they decided to 
     reopen the search.
       ``They hired a white male who fits the traditional image of 
     an AD. You can't tell me of those four people there wasn't 
     one qualified. I just don't think the Ivy League is ready for 
     a woman AD.''
       Fred Knubel, director of public information at Columbia, 
     said ``Davidson's inference is incorrect.
       ``The search for an athletic director was continuous until 
     a consensus was reached,'' he said, reading from a statement. 
     ``Special efforts were made to seek out minorities and women. 
     Along the way, a number of strong candidates withdrew, 
     including one woman who did so for personal reasons at the 
     last moment.''
       Often, there is a smaller pool of qualified female 
     applicants than male for each open position. There is also a 
     feeling among some women in athletic administration that 
     women are less willing to work through the low-paying low-
     status coaching and administrative positions.
       ``Men, for whatever reasons, are more willing to take those 
     entry-level jobs,'' Davidson said. ``They will do anything 
     they have to to succeed. I think part of it has to do with 
     the opportunities that are opening up for women. There are 
     more women lawyers, doctors. It leaves the women's athletic 
     pool smaller.''
       UConn women's basketball coach Geno Auriemma bristles when 
     people say men are intruding on the women's game.
       ``People see me in this big beautiful office inside Gampel 
     Pavilion and say, `How does he get that?' This is my 17th 
     year of coaching. Those five years I coached high schools, I 
     spent working three jobs trying to do that.''
       The early years as difficult as things seem for women in 
     athletics today, it used to be worse.
       In 1979, a patch of grass between two dormitories passed 
     for the varsity softball field at Eastern Connecticut State 
     University in Willimantic. When coach Clyde Washburne hit 
     balls in practice, he had to compete with errant Frisbees and 
     footballs.
       Meanwhile, the baseball team enjoyed a state-of-the-art 
     facility. The baseball coach was athletic director Bill 
     Holowaty. ``I told the athletic director, I told the 
     president, that it wasn't fair to my players safety-wise or 
     to me as a teacher,'' Washburn said. ``By the time practice 
     began, you were angry. It was hard to not take it out on the 
     players.''
       Washburne, who would win four national Division III 
     softball titles before retiring in 1988, took it out on 
     Eastern Connecticut instead--by way of the Boston OCR. After 
     the OCR descended on Eastern and tied up the athletic 
     director's and president's office for several weeks with 
     paperwork, the money for a new fenced-in field and dugouts 
     suddenly appeared.
       Said Holowaty: ``When softball saw what we [baseball] had, 
     they had to have it, too. I said to Clyde, `Fine. I agree 
     with you.' But people forgot how many years it took us to get 
     our field, and we did it with private money. It took us 11 
     years to get lights. You don't do it overnight and you don't 
     tear down a successful program to build something else. They 
     got a softball field a lot quicker than we got our field.''
       After they framed the dugout roofs, Washburne told the OCR 
     he was satisfied and its investigators returned to Boston.
       But when the complex was built, the softball players would 
     look up through the skeleton of the dugout frame at the dark 
     sky and say, ``Isn't this a great place to get in out of the 
     rain?'' It was two years before roofs were added.
       At some colleges, the scramble to accommodate women led to 
     controversy.
       Fred Barakat, the former Fairfield University men's 
     basketball coach, was furious to discover one day, in the 
     mid-1970s, that his office was literally cut in half to make 
     room for the women's basketball coach.
       ``There was no warning. I was shocked by it,'' said 
     Barakat, now the assistant commissioner of the Atlantic Coast 
     Conference.
       ``I was on the brink of something good. I wanted to show 
     recruits what other Division I programs were showing 
     recruits, like a nice office. None of us were ready for it. 
     Coaches didn't understand it.''
       Now, Barakat says of equal opportunity for women: ``It's 
     here to stay and we'd better dance with it.''
       In 1975, UConn offered 12 sports for men, eight for women. 
     Women's soccer, a fledgling sport nationwide, was not one of 
     them.
       Felice Duffy grew up in Storrs as part of a large soccer-
     playing family. When she went to UConn and found no team, she 
     lobbied for one. She said the administration told her and the 
     78 members of her women's soccer club they would have to wait 
     eight years for a varsity program.
       Duffy didn't have eight years.
       Realizing athletic opportunities for men outnumbered those 
     for women at the school, she contacted lawyers and then-U.S. 
     Rep. [[Page S5387]] Christopher Dodd, D-Conn., and finally 
     filed a Title IX complaint. After a year of club status and a 
     year of ``trial varsity'' status, Duffy got her varsity team 
     and became an All-American.
       Duffy now coaches the Yale women's soccer team, which loses 
     to UConn's nationally ranked program every year.
       In the early 70s, most women were simply content to play 
     sports for the first time. Whatever accompanied that new-
     found privilege--scholarships, practice uniforms, new 
     equipment--was more than most expected. At Trinity, for 
     instance, coach Robin Sheppard's field hockey team happily 
     accepted castoff football jerseys as their first uniforms in 
     1974.
       Originally, colleges and secondary schools were given six 
     years, until 1978, to comply with the 1972 law, but progress 
     was slow. Then, Title IX lost most of its punch in 1984, when 
     the Supreme Court ruled that the law's protection extended 
     only to programs directly receiving federal funding, not to 
     the institution as a whole.
       It wasn't until 1988 that the Civil Rights Restoration Act, 
     spearheaded by then-U.S. Sen. Lowell P. Weicker Jr., R-Conn., 
     and fellow Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., put the teeth back 
     into Title IX.
       An awakening Before this year, school officials would get 
     their hands slapped for discriminating against women.
       But this past February, the Supreme Court sent a strong 
     message to schools who practice discrimination. For the first 
     time, the justices agreed to permit a plaintiff to recover 
     monetary damages in a Title IX case. A young woman from 
     Georgia said she was forced into a sexual relationship by a 
     male athletic coach and economics teacher while she was a 
     high school student. A lower court had refused to allow her 
     to seek damages.
       Many believe this decision will encourage more women to 
     file Title IX complaints.
       ``Now,'' said Donna Lopiano, executive director of the 
     Women's Sports Foundation and a Southern Connecticut 
     graduate, ``all the major civil rights issues are at the 
     beginning of a new cycle. People are trying again to get 
     homosexual, racism, sexism issues on the table. I see that as 
     a national trend.''
       To upgrade the women's program at Temple University in 
     Philadelphia, athletes pursued a Title IX lawsuit through the 
     courts for almost a decade. Female basketball players at the 
     College of William & Mary in Williamsburg, Va., and the 
     University of Oklahoma in Norman threatened lawsuits to keep 
     their teams from being cut.
       Like New Hampshire's Hyde, they took matters into their own 
     hands. Still, women like Hyde remain in the minority.
       ``I had one athlete say the other night, `Title 19, or 
     whatever . . .' It makes me sad,'' said Quinnipiac's Wooster. 
     ``Kids in this day and age expect these opportunities.''
     

                          ____________________