According to a progress report released Wednesday, the NCAA is adequately addressing nine of its 23 recommendations for creating an NCAA tournament experience comparable to male and female basketball players.
The largest governing body for college sports has hired a third party to assess its response to a bitter report issued almost a year ago that criticized gender inequality in tournaments.
Among the most visible changes in the progress report are the increase in “March Madness” branding and cross-promotion for both 2022 tournaments, and the addition of four teams to the women’s tournament, “First Four”. The event has been created. Along the structure of the men’s tournament.
According to the report, the NCAA Men’s and Women’s Basketball Commissions jointly rejected the proposal to hold a final four in the same city at the same time, and NCAA’s leadership will not change Division I’s basketball management structure. I decided that. In short, Women’s Basketball Vice President Lynn Holtzmann continues to report to Basketball’s Senior Vice President Dan Gabit.
An outside company was hired to carry out the assessment, and the NCAA respected the company’s request not to be identified in accordance with company policy, Meghan Durham, NCAA’s Associate Director of Communications, told The Associated Press by email. ..
“The results of this assessment show our commitment to promoting gender equality in the NCAA Championship. Thanks to our spirit of cooperation, we achieved great results last year,” said NCAA President Mark Emart. Says. “We said that before-our work is not over. Gender equality must remain a priority for leaders throughout college sports, and we make these efforts. I look forward to continuing to move forward. “
The first report, published in August, was produced by Kaplan Hecker & FinkLLP, which was adopted after the NCAA was unable to provide similar equipment to the team in the 2021 Men’s and Women’s Division I Tournament.
The tournament took place in a “bubble” for a pandemic, where players blew up social media with dissatisfaction showing the difference between men’s and women’s weight training facilities, food, lounge areas, and gifts, and urged NCAA executives to apologize. ..
The NCAA was unable to support its efforts for gender equality by prioritizing men’s cash cow tournaments “over everything else,” according to Kaplan’s report, and issued recommendations made or considered by the NCAA. ..
The progress report states that the issues that female players have focused on have been resolved. And in addition to improving the brand, the NCAA has increased its full-time staff to tackle women’s tournaments. Improved communication between the Men’s Basketball Committee and the Women’s Basketball Committee. We have launched a program to identify and track areas that need to be the same, comparable and different in the experience of men’s and women’s tournaments. We hired a third party to produce an annual report on the Gender Equality Initiative. We have issued a statement on how or how gender equality issues are being addressed.
The progress report also noted that the NCAA will increase the women’s tournament cost budget for 2022 by $ 6.1 million, adding another $ 1 million.
Among the areas underway: Hire full-time employees to focus on the issue of women and gender equality. Start a third-party evaluation of the progress of gender equality every five years. Emphasize new corporate sponsorship for women’s tournaments. Pursue promotional and marketing opportunities that benefit both tournaments. Women’s first four and “March Madness” coats and hoops in the first and second rounds have boosted brand awareness.
In the future, the NCAA aims to pursue the independent rights of women’s tournaments when existing media and marketing contracts expire in 2024, the report said. Distribution plan in line with the men’s tournament.
NCAA revenues exceeded $ 1 billion in the year before the pandemic, of which nearly $ 900 million was related to media rights transactions between CBS and Turner in the men’s tournament.
The Women’s Tournament is part of a package that includes more than 20 other NCAA championships owned by ESPN and paying about $ 34 million annually from 2023 to 24. However, women’s tournaments are worth $ 81- $ 112 million annually from 2025, according to an assessment made for Kaplan by a team of sports media and marketing experts.
