Kevin D. Liles for The New York Times
When federal authorities dropped a bombshell nearly two years ago with the announcement of a wide-ranging college basketball corruption investigation, the notoriously laborious N.C.A.A. leapt at an opportunity it had long been eyeing.
Within weeks, it had marshaled a commission headed by Condoleezza Rice to seize control of the grassroots basketball world, whose bustling underground economy has been driven for years by money from shoe companies and agents. The N.C.A.A. also pulled in other basketball stakeholders: the N.B.A. and its players union, U.S.A. Basketball, the national high school federation and the National Association of Basketball Coaches.