Lehigh athletics program among nations best

Lehigh University has joined college athletics superstars Duke, Stanford, Princeton, Georgetown, Boston College and others in the inaugural U.S. News and World Report’s College Sports Honor Roll released today, March 11, 2002. The honor roll recognizes 20 schools with the best overall rankings across four categories of achievement: graduation rates, number of sports programs offered, gender equity, and win/loss records. Lehigh ranked first in the graduation rates category.
The top 20 institutions, listed alphabetically, include: Boston College, Brown University, Cornell University, Dartmouth College, Duke University, Georgetown University, Harvard University, Lehigh, Penn State University, Princeton University, Stanford University, University of Connecticut, University of Hawaii-Manoa, University of Illinois, University of Maryland, University of Massachusetts, University of Michigan, University of New Hampshire, University of Utah, and Villanova University.
The schools that are listed represent some of the best athletics operations in the nation, so we are pleased to be included among them, said Lehigh director of athletics Joe Sterrett. Although statistics and rankings can sometimes tell less than the whole story, this analysis seems to identify the key areas for measuring athletics programs. Do we graduate our kids? Do we play by the rules and are we equitable? Do we offer a full complement of sports? And perhaps the most likely of questions, do we achieve success? At Lehigh we’ve long known that we can offer an enthusiastic ‘yes’ to every one of the questions, but it’s gratifying to be recognized nationally for doing these things well.