WSU football maintains stable academic progress score

PULLMAN – Washington State’s football team received a multi-year Academic Progress Rate (APR) score of 964 from the NCAA on Wednesday, firmly above the threshold at which penalties are issued.

The APR is used by the NCAA to measure a school’s ability to keep players academically eligible and in school. The score is calculated by awarding points for each player that remains academically eligible or graduates, and schools are judged based on their four-year average score.

Last year the football team’s four-year average was 965.

The WSU women’s cross country team received a perfect APR score of 1,000, while women’s track and volleyball got close with scores of 991 and 994, respectively. For the 2015-16 academic year, women’s basketball, golf, tennis, men’s golf and volleyball all posted perfect scores of 1,000.

“Once again, the NCAA APR data for 2015-16 reflects a true team effort by our student-athletes, coaches and staff,” said athletic director Bill Moos in a press release. “Their dedication to our continued academic success is commendable.”

The lowest-scoring program was men’s basketball at 953, which is an improvement over last year’s multi-year average of 949.

The men’s basketball team was close to falling below the multi-year threshold of 930 a couple years ago, at which point the NCAA would have issued sanctions such as a postseason ban. But the team began posting higher APR scores with the arrival of coach Ernie Kent in 2014 and avoided penalties.