Beer and Circus: How Big-time College Sports Is Crippling Undergraduate Education A stunning outline of the contemporary educational landscape, Sperber's book provides a stark analysis of academia's abandonment of its undergraduate students. Alluding to the ancient Roman practice of placating people with cheap bread and ostentatious spectacles, Sperber argues that an ever-growing number of state universities lure undergraduates to their schools with halcyon images of booze-filled parties and prominent sports programs while abandoning their commitment to the students' education. Administrators use the students' sorely needed tuition dollars to fund sports, build research facilities and hire world-class faculty members, who give the school prestige but scarcely give their legions of undergraduate charges the time of day. With an eye fastened on the dangerous phenomenon of binge drinking, Sperber (College Sports Inc.) backs his assertions with responses to a questionnaire he circulated to students across the country, interviews with professors and administrators and frequent citations from sociological studies. Sperber methodically attempts to persuade readers that at the largest universities, where the majority of young Americans attain their undergraduate degrees, "the party scene connected to big-time sports events replaces meaningful undergraduate education." Though he admits his work deals mainly with anecdotal rather than scientific proof, the wealth of evidence Sperber amasses to support his convictions makes for a striking, sobering read. Addresses sport culture around big-time college football and basketball for the most part.

Counting Coup: A True Story of Basketball and Honor on the Little Big Horn On many Indian reservations, high-school basketball has become a popular venue for expressing the pride of Native Americans. Yet for all the promise these young Indian athletes exhibit, few are able to overcome the negative forces--poverty, alcoholism, teen pregnancy, poor education--that surround them. Colton, a former professional baseball player and veteran author, spent 15 months on the Crow reservation in Montana observing the Hardin High School girls' basketball team. He focuses on the players--especially talented Sharon LaForge--and their relationships with their teammates and coaches, but he also explores the social conditions that affect the players' lives. Alcoholism is a reservation plague, but drug abuse, domestic violence, shoddy education, and low personal expectations also help prevent these children from ever reaching their potential, on and off the court. But Colton also finds joy, humor, and ethnic pride among the reservation populace. Similar in tone to Kareem Abdul Jabbar's recent A Season on the Reservation , Colton's book tells an inspirational story but one firmly grounded in reality. There are no Hoosier-like state championships and no soaring personal triumphs. Sharon LaForge doesn't get a college scholarship; she ends up pregnant, and she quits basketball. But she also enrolls in junior college and is doggedly pursuing her education despite long odds. On the rez, victories are not recorded in scorebooks or by sweeping social reform, but by proud people taking control of their lives inch by hard-fought inch. Addresses race and women’s basketball, along with alcoholism and family situations.

Fixed: How Goodfellas Bought Boston College Basketball Big-time mobsters, All-American athletes and high-powered lawyers are but a few of the intriguing characters who appear in this, action-packed account of the 1978-1979 Boston College point-shaving scandal. A veteran sportswriter and columnist traces the scandal from its creation in the summer of 1978 through the trials of the players and mobsters in 1981; particularly fascinating is his exploration of how the scam affected the players mentally and the relationship between them and the gangsters. The book expertly portrays the primary characters, who include Jim Sweeny, an Academic All-American and a Naismith award winner who is described by the gangsters as "the perfect front," and ex-mobster-turned-star government witness Henry Hill, the man who wrote Wiseguy, the book that the movie Goodfellas was based on. The first part of the book is devoted to the planning and execution of the scheme to shave point and then examines the '78-'79 season game by game, showing how the sinister plan unfolded. The second part of the book relates the details of the investigation and the trials of the case in 1981 and is even more absorbing than the first. Addresses gambling, cheating and men’s college basketball. Addresses gambling, cheating and men's college basketball.

Game of Shadows: Barry Bonds, BALCO, and the Steroids Scandal that Rocked Professional Sports Fainaru-Wada and Lance Williams tell the story of BALCO and the investigation that has shaken the foundations of the sporting world. They reveal how an obscure, self-proclaimed nutritionist, Victor Conte, became a steroid svengali to multi-millionaire athletes desperate for a competitive edge, and how he created superstars with his potent cocktails of miracle drugs. They expose the international web of coaches and trainers who funneled athletes to BALCO, and how the drug cheats stayed a step ahead of the testing agencies and the law. They detail how an aggressive IRS investigator doggedly gathered evidence until Conte and his co-conspirators were brought to justice. And at the center of the story is the biggest star of them all, Barry Bonds, the muscle-bound MVP outfielder of the San Francisco Giants whose suspicious late-career renaissance has him threatening Hank Aaron’s all-time home run record. Addresses cheating and baseball in particular.