Some new highs for Graduation Gap Bowl

I FEEL LIKE Chris Berman of ESPN. With unprecedented passion, I can almost scream, "They . .. can. . . go. . . all. . . the. . . way! It's a 92-yard touch. . . No! . . . Graduation rate!" In the most encouraging sign yet that embarrassed colleges are fed up with the dumb-jock image, a record percentage of bowl-bound football programs scored a "touchdown" in my 13th annual Graduation Gap Bowl. A "touchdown" means a team graduates at least 50 percent of both black and white players, and has a racial gap of fewer than 15 percentage points.

The "touchdown" teams have more than doubled in the last four years. In the 2004 Graduation Gap Bowl, only 12 of 56 bowl teams (21 percent) made it to the end zone of academics. This year, 30 of the 68 bowl teams (44 percent) did the college version of the Lambeau Leap. Just as impressive, the combined number of teams that scored either a "touchdown" or a "first down" (high graduation rates, but with large racial gaps) has also more than doubled in three years. In the 2005 Gap Bowl, only 19 of 56 teams (34 percent) scored either. This year, 49 of the 68 (72 percent!) did so. The "touchdown" teams once again included Boston College and Connecticut.

Unfortunately, the national title game in the Bowl Championship Series has Florida vs. Oklahoma. Florida has a 68 percent graduation rate but a 25-percentage-point racial disparity. Oklahoma should flat-out be disqualified with a 46 percent graduation rate. Four other BCS bowl schools - Ohio State, Texas, Alabama, and Utah - have black graduation rates under 50 percent and an average racial gap of 30 percentage points. The gaps at all four schools were significantly worse than four years ago. Still, the overall improvements this year seeped up to the top five bowl games in the BCS. For the first time, more than one BCS game pits two "touchdown" teams: The Penn State/Southern Cal Rose Bowl and the Virginia Tech/Cincinnati Orange Bowl.

Speaking of Cincinnati, let's give credit where it is due. I've called its basketball program "Sinsinnati" for going years without graduating black players. Its football team eight years ago had a 37 percent graduation rate. Today, Cincinnati's football program graduates 68 percent of its black players along with 81 percent of its white players. Finally, even Cincinnati could. . . go. . . all. . . the. . . way!