Men's basketball one of 13 IU programs to post perfect single-year APR score
It's debatable whether Archie Miller left the Indiana men's basketball program's on-court product in a better position than when he arrived in April 2017. But when he was fired, he certainly handed the program over to Mike Woodson in a much better academic situation.
The NCAA released Academic Progress Rate scores Tuesday for the 2020-21 school year, Miller's last at the helm. Men's basketball was one of 13 IU programs to post a perfect single-year score of 1,000, and it posted a nearly perfect four-year score of 995. The NCAA did not release APR statistics for the 2019-20 school year, which was affected by the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, but IU men's basketball also posted 1,000 in 2018-19.
Those scores represent a drastic improvement from those at the end of the Tom Crean era. Crean inherited an even greater academic mess after Kelvin Sampson resigned due to a recruiting scandal. After posting a score of 811 in 2007-08, Sampson's final year, the Hoosiers posted four straight perfect scores of 1,000 from 2009-13. However, they posted a 978 in 2013-14, a 943 in 2014-15, a 918 in 2015-16 and a 920 the year Crean was fired in 2016-17. Indiana's four-year score fell to 943, not far above the 930 cutoff mark that makes teams ineligible for postseason competition.
That academic situation made it imperative that Miller retain as many players as possible when he arrived, and Indiana posted a single-year score of 980 in 2017-18 to move the Hoosiers away from the danger zone.
Joining the men's basketball program with perfect single-year scores were women's basketball, women's cross-country, men's and women's golf, men's soccer, softball, men's and women's swimming and diving, men's and women's tennis, women's volleyball and wrestling. The men's and women's golf teams and women's tennis teams posted perfect four-year scores of 1,000.
The women's basketball team also posted a four-year score of 995, joining men's basketball and men's soccer as three of 12 programs with four-year scores of 990 or better. The football team posted a single-year score of 987 for a four-year score of 976. The baseball team posted a single-year score of 991 and a four-year score of 971.
Indiana's single-year score across all sports was 988. The men's track and field program posted a single-year score of 935 and four-year score of 961, both lowest in the department but safe for postseason competition.
"It is a source of pride for our entire department whenever we see how well our students are performing in the classroom, and that is once again the case with our latest APR report," IU athletic director Scott Dolson said in a press release. "This is credit not only to our students who put in the work, but also our Academic Services staff led by Lo Price as well as our coaching staffs that emphasize the importance of succeeding academically."
According to the NCAA, the APR is calculated as follows: Each student-athlete receiving athletically related financial aid earns one point for staying in school and one point for being academically eligible. A team’s total points are divided by points possible and then multiplied by 1,000.
Follow Herald-Times IU Insider Dustin Dopirak on Twitter at @DustinDopirak or email him at DDopirak@gannett.com.
This article originally appeared on The Herald-Times: Indiana basketball posts perfect NCAA academic progress rate score
