For all the talk about how college sports exploits athletes, the fact is that if you're a scholarship athlete, and you take the trouble to actually go to class and graduate, you go out into the world with no debt. Chuck Spirou, whose kid plays for a New Hampshire team which went to Vegas to compete recently, gets it: "It's that $160,000 (for four years of college tuition). So many kids, if they can swing it, will come out of college in debt for years with all those loans. They'll hit the ground with a weight tied around them. That's why the chance of coming out here, playing in a tournament like this and winning a scholarship is so huge to the athletes and their families."
When he was at Duke, Phil Henderson said that Duke was exploiting him, but that he was exploiting Duke in return. Not everyone can make in Australia, much less the NBA. For the rest, a free education is a fine deal.
