Date of Award
4-8-2011
Document Type
Thesis
Abstract
On March 4, 2011, Jacob Tucker, a senior at Illinois College in Jacksonville, Illinois, uploaded a two-minute and fourteen-second video of him dunking on youtube in the hopes that he would be considered to receive an invitation to the annual NCAA dunk contest. Within a few days, the video was posted on facebook, linked on Twitter, and talked about on “Rome is Burning,” Jim Rome’s ESPN show. By March 9, the video had over one million views and earned Tucker the chance to be voted into the dunk contest. Soon afterward, the NCAA announced that it would have a competition between Tucker and University of Lee senior Larriques Cunningham to decide who would be given the last spot in the dunk contest on April 1. Tucker won, receiving 88% of the vote, becoming the only Division III athlete in the contest (Powers, 2011). If an unexpected media frenzy can catapult an unassuming 5’11” basketball player from an NCAA Division III institution into the running for the dunk contest during the Final Four, what can it do to an institution with an atypically successful athletic season?
Recommended Citation
McGrady, Meredith '11, "After the Ball: The effect of Cinderella seasons on college admissions and enrollment at NCAA Division I institutions" (2011). Honor Scholar Theses. 257, Scholarly and Creative Work from DePauw University.
https://scholarship.depauw.edu/studentresearch/257