NCAA hires law firm to conduct gender equity review of men's and women's basketball tournaments

The NCAA has hired a civil rights law firm to conduct a gender-equity review for its men's and women's basketball tournaments less than a week after the organization was widely criticized for disparities between the two tournaments.

"The NCAA will continue to aggressively address material and impactful differences between the Division I Men's and Women's Basketball Championships," NCAA President Mark Emmet said in a statement Thursday. "While many of the operational issues identified have been resolved, we must continue to make sure we are doing all we can to support gender equity in sports." The organization hired the law firm Kaplan Hecker & Fink LLP to examine its policies and provide recommendations on how it can improve. "As part of this effort, we are evaluating the current and previous resource allocation to each championship, so we have a clear understanding of costs, spend and revenue," Emmet said.