Scorecard

Have you noticed the amazing season American skiers have just completed in Europe? Perhaps you haven't. Over the years this country hasn't fared all that well in either Nordic or Alpine skiing, and the public closely follows those sports only during Olympics. But now, because of what's been going on in Europe, Bill Marolt, U.S. Alpine Team director, is able to say flatly, "Things have turned around for us, no doubt about it."

Marolt has reason to exult. Following their strong showing in the world championships in Austria (SI, Feb. 15), U.S. skiers have cleaned up on the World Cup circuit. In Alpine skiing the Mahre twins, Phil and Steve, finished first and third in the men's standings and constituted, all by themselves, the third best men's team in the world. Besides winning the overall title, Phil Mahre won the combined championship and ended Ingemar Stenmark's four-year reign in the giant slalom and the Swedish star's seven-year domination of the special slalom. On the women's list, Americans Christin Cooper and Cindy Nelson placed third and fifth overall, Holly Flanders tied for second in the downhill and the U.S. won the women's team title. Counting a season-ending victory in the slalom last week in France by Cooper, Americans won 13 World Cup races, the U.S.'s most successful season ever.

Even more remarkable was the U.S. showing in Nordic skiing. By winning the final 15-km. race of the season last week in Italy, Bill Koch wrapped up the first World Cup overall cross-country championship ever by an American. Last month in Sweden Koch and another American, Dan Simoneau, finished first and second in a 30-km. race, and on Sunday Koch, Simoneau, Tim Caldwell and Jim Galanes became the first U.S. men's team ever to win a cross-country relay.

Marolt insists that the U.S. triumphs are the result not of luck but of a successful overhaul of the country's skiing program. And he buoyantly says, "Now we'll just have to achieve the same success in the 1984 Olympics."

DIGGER'S NON-BOMBSHELL

In recent years there have been many allegations of cash payments and other improper inducements to college basketball players. Mark Aguirre, then playing for DePaul, told the Chicago Tribune two years ago that when he was in high school, one unnamed college coach offered him $5,000 and a new car if Aguirre would attend the coach's school, and another promised $10,000 and a trip to Hawaii. Last February several members of the Portland Trail Blazers said they had been offered cars, apartments and airline tickets by college recruiters. Clemson was put on NCAA probation in the early 1970s for, in part, payments made to players by then-Coach Tates Locke; in a recent SI story on Locke (March 8), former Clemson star Wayne (Tree) Rollins was quoted as saying he had received $60,000 from Clemson boosters while attending the school. UCLA is currently on NCAA probation because, among other transgressions, several of its basketball players had received cars or other gifts from boosters. Wichita State is on NCAA probation for infractions that include gifts to players of cash and airline tickets.

Considered against this backdrop, last week's remarks by Notre Dame Coach Digger Phelps on the subject of cheating in college basketball weren't the bombshell they seemed to be. Phelps frequently speaks out against what he says is rampant cheating in the sport, and he reiterated these views in an interview with New York Times Reporter Gordon S. White Jr., in New Orleans on the eve of the NCAA's Final Four. He told White he believed that as many as 50% of schools may be cheating, that $10,000 a year was the "going price" for payments to star players, that he knew of "at least seven" schools that cheated, that two of them had illegally outrecruited Notre Dame by paying athletes and that he had reported those two schools to the NCAA. But Phelps declined to identify either the players or schools involved.

Did Phelps have firsthand information to support his charges? In a subsequent TV interview on CBS, he left the impression that he didn't. Referring to one of his charges, he now spoke of "rumors" that the going rate for star recruits "may be" $10,000. Vague though Phelps's allegations to White were, they created a sensation. One reason was that the Times had for some reason seen fit to run the story on the front page. It also happened that the story broke at a time when sportswriters and coaches were all assembled in New Orleans for the NCAA tournament. The inevitable result was intense speculation by those present about which schools Phelps might have had in mind.

There were complaints that by airing his suspicions about cheating just before the NCAA championship, Phelps had unnecessarily cast a shadow over that event. Others criticized the Times for overplaying what was essentially old news. Yet the flap did have the benefit of calling attention to what practically everybody agreed was a major problem besetting college athletics. And one part of the interview that was new was Phelps's revelation that he had reported two schools to the NCAA. Because it lacks subpoena power, the NCAA is often hamstrung in enforcing its rules. Phelps admitted to SI that it's often "very difficult for [the NCAA] to do anything" with the type of information he provided. Still, tips from rival coaches are a major factor in developing those cases of cheating that the NCAA is able to prosecute successfully. That Phelps would openly speak of having come forward with information, however skimpy it may be, might encourage other coaches to be more forthcoming, too. If so, something else good will have come out of Digger's non-bombshell.

UNITY AND DISSENT