Dear Titan Fans,

I am writing today to address the men's basketball program as it relates to the NCAA Academic Progress Rate (APR) report scheduled for release tomorrow, May 5.

Unfortunately, the men's basketball program did not meet the required 930 APR standard set forth by the NCAA. As a result, the program will face sanctions for the upcoming 2026-27 season, which includes a NCAA postseason ban, which is particularly disappointing.

We expect the question "How could this happen?" and the answer is complex.

The APR continues to be a meaningful measure of the overall academic health of our athletics programs, and we support its role in promoting accountability and student success. However, with the current APR formula, many in college athletics believe that there is an overreliance on narrow, potentially biased measures that can perpetuate inequities and may undermine the broader educational mission.

As the NCAA continues to modernize its bylaws and rules, we are hopeful the APR model will evolve as well to better reflect the on-campus, real-life dynamics faced by institutions, student-athletes, and coaches.

Within the current structure, certain student-athlete decisions—such as attending a junior college for further development, stepping away from higher education to pursue professional opportunities both athletically and non-athletically, or navigating the competitive nature of revenue share and NIL—are reflected in APR scores.

In this environment, we are seeing student-athletes make transfer decisions based on a variety of considerations, including academic and personal financial gains. While these departures do not always result in lost retention points, they can affect the cohort in a way that increases the weight of any eligibility or retention challenges, beyond academic
achievement itself.

While our program has undergone several changes over the last few years, we now have a new academic improvement plan in place to address the evolving NCAA era. Head coach Mark Montgomery is committed to the Titans, and the coaching staff has been fully invested in academic monitoring and success since their arrival last year.

We have six student-athletes returning, along with four incoming freshmen and two transfers, even after sharing this news with them. Their decisions to keep their commitments and continue building toward a championship-level program speaks volumes about their character and the culture being established.

Given the momentum from this past season, we recognize this is not the outcome anyone hoped for. Our athletics staff pursued all available avenues for adjustments, including waivers and appeals, but ultimately those efforts were not successful.

I am optimistic about the future because our department APR has consistently reflected strong academic performance, with many programs exceeding their sport's national benchmark and several earning perfect 1,000 scores. More than 90% of our student-athletes graduate, and their success beyond UDM speaks for itself. This past fall, 16 of our 17 programs earned a team GPA of 3.0 or higher, with 155 of our 300 student-athletes named to the Dean's List, 32 achieving a perfect 4.0, and 256 earning a GPA of 3.0 or above while competing at the Division I level.

We appreciate the continued support of our campus community, alumni, and fans, and everyone should know, we are addressing these challenges, and the program is dedicated on the most success it can achieve and winning a Horizon League regular season championship.

Sincerely,
Director of Athletics
Robert C. Vowels, Jr.