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NEWBERRY (AP) — Newberry College President Mitchell Zais said Wednesday his school will retire its “Indians” nickname, although he still disagrees with the NCAA’s stance against his school’s athletic tradition.

The college will play as Newberry College starting in 2008-09 until a new nickname is selected.

“I still contend this is inappropriate for the NCAA,” Zais said. “They’ve got a lot of other problems they need to pay attention to.”

Zais was among the harshest critics when Newberry showed up on the NCAA’s list of schools who could face postseason bans if they did not change from Native American nicknames, symbols and logos the organization said were offensive.

He wrote in 2005 to NCAA president Myles Brand that the school would not give up its nickname under any circumstances. “We find the NCAA’s decision arbitrary and capricious and, frankly, discriminatory to our college,” Zais said in the letter.

Still, Zais said as the controversy dragged on, it became too difficult a choice between “resisting the NCAA’s efforts to impose political correctness” and supporting student-athletes who had earned and deserved chances to compete for NCAA titles.

“In the end, we decided to support our student-athletes,” Zais said.

Newberry’s board of trustees voted last month to abandon the nickname, complying with a 2006 agreement it had with the NCAA that allowed the school’s football team to host its first ever playoff game.

Newberry was given two years by the NCAA to resolve the issue.

NCAA spokesman Bob Williams said Wednesday his group was pleased with Newberry’s continuing evolution in giving up its old nickname.

Zais said the school will take on the task of wiping out references to “Indians” and its arrowhead and spear logos. That means new uniforms and logos on helmets and other athletic equipment and a redesigned Web site. The school also must paint over part of a large sign outside the football team’s Setzler Field that reads “Welcome to Newberry College. Home of the Indians,” complete with a tribal chief in headdress and the school’s “NC” inside an arrowhead.

Zais estimated the cost for change to be about $118,000, a steep price for a school with an enrollment of about 820.

“There are a lot of people that are mad about this,” said Billy Walker, head of the college’s trustees.

Faculty, students, alumni and others around campus will be asked about a new nickname, which could take two years, Zais said.

The issue is divisive among the university family. A poll of Newberry faculty was unanimous against the Indians’ nickname, Walker said.

“We respect that position, but at the same time, we have respect the wishes of the body politic of the campus and let everyone have their input,” Walker said.

One option the college is pursuing is gaining approval from the Eastern Band of Cherokees, whose land the school rests on. The tribe will take a second campus visit in July, Zais said. Should Newberry eventually adopt the Cherokee name, it would allow the school to honor the tribe’s “courage, persistence, indomitable spirit and willingness to fight against insurmountable odds,” Zais said.

It might also satisfy the scores of alumni who’ve written Zais and other administrators angered by the change. Zais recalled a message from one pastor who said he would go “to heaven as a Newberry Indian.”

Football coach Zak Willis says his players have been largely unaffected by the controversy. He thinks that might change as they see their traditions, like a stone arrowhead players rub before home games, vanish.

Until a new name is picked, Newberry students will have to cheer for dear, old “Newberry College.”

“It gets us upset because we’ve been Indians since we’ve been here,” said senior-to-be Heather Warren. “Next year, we’re nothing.”

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