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BEHIND THE DESK B A R RY A LVA R EZ • UW DIREC TOR OF AT H L ET IC S NCAA on right track with rule reforms I 've been impressed by NCAA president Mark Emmert and his effort to streamline and simplify the rulebook. He understands the problems and he's on the right track. More importantly, he has some solutions. The latest reforms will eliminate about 25 pages from the rulebook, and the NCAA will get away from the micromanaging that has been going on with recruiting and some other things. Coaches can make unlimited contacts with recruits through texting and social media. If you want to work hard, or harder than the next guy, and text a lot, you can do that. But everybody has a cell and it shows who's contacting them, so the kids don't have to respond if they don't want to. That relieves our compliance people from having to go over all the phone logs. In the past, if some coaches wanted to cheat, they could cheat. They could buy disposable phones or do some other things that you can't track to get around the rules. Deregulation just makes sense in some of these areas. Last year, there were some changes to the enforcement structure which I also agreed with. That included holding head coaches more accountable for what their assistants were doing. I want to hold all coaches accountable. If somebody is flagrantly breaking the rules and not paying attention to what is being said and 14 » VARSITY JANUA RY 24, 2013 continually challenging the NCAA, it has to be addressed. It's easy for anyone to say, "Clean it up. There are too many rules.'' But I think the NCAA is moving in the right direction under President Emmert. They're cleaning things up ― things that are very difficult to follow and trace. I think the NCAA is moving in the right direction under President Emmert. They're cleaning things up. The NCAA is even going to allow schools to have recruiting coordinators again. The coordinators no longer have to be a member of the coaching staff. I especially like it for football. I don't know why they went away from it in the first place. One of the benefits is that you will have one person who will have a good feel for the entire recruiting class. They will study the board and know what your team needs are. If you have a position coach who's not only worried about coaching a group of guys and recruiting a specific area but overseeing every else in recruiting, it can get convoluted. When I came to Wisconsin, my recruiting coordinator was Rob Ianello. He didn't necessarily do all of the evaluations, but Rob was the one who organized everything. He assigned the assistants to the areas where they would recruit and he set up the schedules. Rob made you work, too. He made guys responsible and accountable for their specific recruiting areas and for getting certain people there. He stayed on top of everything. I know it made my job as a head coach a lot easier knowing that he had our people in place to handle recruiting. He was an indispensable member of our team. In those first few years, we really recruited well. It had to do with having Rob ― who didn't have a position to coach ― and having some assistants who could be trusted in recruiting. I had worked with many of the guys in the past and I wasn't going to bring in anybody here unless they were a good fit and they were going to get the job done. I could trust Dan McCarney and Bernie Wyatt and I knew that they were going to recruit very hard. I knew Kevin Cosgrove and how he recruited, and I knew what I was going to get out of him. I had continuity with my staff, not unlike what Gary (Andersen) has with his staff. From what I know of his new assistants, it seems like a good mix to me. I don't know them well beyond one conversation. But the fact that Gary has worked with most of them tells me something. He can trust them.