NCAA can’t, won’t dictate terms of coverage

LITTLE ROCK — It was time to stand up for principles.

Sunday, reporters and photographers from the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette were not on press row or in the press workroom for UALR’s opening game against Delaware in the NCAA Women’s Basketball Tournament.

We bought tickets and covered it from seats in the stands rather than agree to NCAA policies that not only trample our free press rights, but our property rights, too.

As a condition for media credentials, the NCAA now requires news organizations to sign away control of their photographs and their video related to events as well as editorial control of video highlights.

So, if we took a picture of Delaware’s Elena Delle Donne, arguably the best player in the country, making a game-winning play, we couldn’t give or sell a copy of the photo to proud parents or grandparents.

A picture taken by our photographer with his camera on company time; a photo of their daughter or granddaughter.

Playing for a taxpayer-financed sports program at the taxpayer-owned Jack Stephens Center at UALR, a taxpayer-owned university.

Because the NCAA wants to create a monopoly for itself, member schools and the for profit marketing companies with which they sign exclusive contracts. They want all the proud parents and grandparents in the country to either pay them whatever they demand or to do without.

News companies and industry and professional associations nationwide have protested the policy.

When approached more than a month ago about the NCAA policy, an NCAA official basically said it is the NCAA’s event and its rules. We could either sign away our property rights to them or be denied admission to press facilities.

It is their way or the highway.

This newspaper chose another route because we felt our readers deserve to have local news in their local newspaper written by local reporters without giving up what belongs to the newspaper.

So we bought tickets and went to the NCAA Tournament as spectators with notepads and cameras.

For the University of Arkansas Razorbacks’ game against Dayton in College Station, Texas, we relied principally on Associated Press reports.

I had to watch on television because I’m at the Cleveland Clinic, where my wife is having tests run to find out why she hasn’t been able to keep solid food down since Jan. 1.

If I had been there, I would have been in the stands, too. The newspaper’s decision was bigger than one person or one event. In fact, the NCAA’s policy ends my run of covering consecutive Final Fours at 30.

Maybe this won’t make a difference in the NCAA’s world, but fewer newspapers cover its event each year, and attendance is in decline (by more than 20 percent at last year’s NCAA regionals).

I have no fight with the NCAA. There are four or five people who work there who I know personally and who I like and respect.

I also have no hard feelings toward the officials at UALR. The problem is with the NCAA’s policy, not UALR.

Why do we and nationwide professional associations feel so strongly about this issue?

Because no self-respecting news organization would ever allow the NCAA to dictate how news coverage can be presented; or hand over its work product as the price of access to news; or remain silent while helping the NCAA try to convert taxpayer-owned programs, institutions and property into a private financial monopoly.

These NCAA rules may be sports 2012 style, but we are part of the team that has always been known as the watchdog of the people.

So rather than sign away editorial control or what belongs to us, we compromised so we could do our jobs the right way.