Yet another reason to move past the silly "amateur" label. We all agree that math is more central to a university's mission, while basketball is more marketable. So let boosters, agents, and advertising firms do what they do best: take care of the marketing. Bring on the cash flow (within reason). If the net rewards for top bball recruits end up being more valuable than a math scholarship...well, that's life. At least the university could redirect some resources from the neverending "compliance" game and focus on
its core competencies: recruiting, retaining, and educating students.
By the way, the prizes in the Putnam (national math contest) are quite nice: $2500 for students and $25,000 for the winning team. Nothing extravagant, and definitely not comparable to what Nike could offer, but that's still a lot of beer money for college kids. On a similar note, I saw a statistic once that 80% of former Putnam Fellows are millionaires. (can't find the source, sadly, but it makes sense -- who's most likely to understand compound interest, if not math whizzes? not to mention their widespread desirability on Wall Street) Of course, if math were regulated by the NCAA, students wouldn't be allowed to keep the prizes. Plus, all of their summer internships would have to be unpaid. Crazy