Brandon is all for frequent drug testing of U-M athletes

Last week, ESPN.com documented increased marijuana use among college football players. Michigan athletic director Dave Brandon was included in the story, detailing how U-M’s drug-testing policy has significantly changed under his watch.
Brandon addressed the issue earlier this week after a news conference formally introducing Michigan’s new women’s basketball coach, Kim Barnes Arico.
“We went through a total education process,” Brandon said. “We implemented a new policy. We made it really clear that one of our values at Michigan athletics is to be a drug-free athletic program. We’re not going to put up with it.
“We’re going to do everything we know how to do to prevent it. Thing we know how to do are to test incessantly. To me drug testing is not something you worry about the budget — you make sure you test on a frequent enough basis that people know you mean what you say because if you don’t test frequently, young people will think, well, they’ll play Russion Roulette and hope they don’t get tested. If you do drugs, you’re going to get tested. I haven’t heard any learned person in the world say drug usage is good for the performance of athletic teams. We have strong feelings about it, we have a strong policy.”
Brandon said the strong approach to drug testing has gone a long way toward improving results.
“I’m very proud of our student-athletes,” Brandon said. “The last year, I would put our results up against anybody in the country and we test for synthetic (drugs) and for regular marijuana as well as other drugs.”