In sports, emotions often override logic. Take for example when folks discuss what Tennessee's men's and women's basketball coaches should be paid. This issue has been percolating among fans for about three weeks and it seems (from looking at last week's letters to the editor) that many folks don't quite understand the issue at hand.

Clearly there's a very vocal group of fans who believe Pat Summitt should be paid just as much as Bruce Pearl. "If she's not, it's a slap in her face!" "It's sexism!"

No it isn't. It's business. Good business. But hear me out.

Should Summit get a raise for her body of work and career achievements? Sure. For the job she did this season? I've got no problem with that, either. Should she get a raise that makes her the nation's highest-paid women's coach? I think so. Should she get a raise for being a great ambassador for UT? OK.

Should she get a raise because she's a woman and a woman should be paid just as much as a man? No way.

Not in this case. Some of you will stop reading here, letting logic go up in smoke because your brains are on fire with anger, but you'll be missing the point.

I don't believe in glass ceilings. I think that a woman who does the same job as a man in the same company and does it just as well should be paid the same as the man. And vice versa. Sexism is every bit as ignorant as racism.

So it's too bad that the Summitt salary issue has nothing to do with sexism. It would make things so much easier if it did.

While Summitt and Pearl are equals on the court (actually she has six national titles, he has one), it's their sports - men's and women's basketball - that AREN'T equal.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not one of these jokers who runs around saying that women's basketball is "fake" basketball just because I can't stand to see someone else enjoying something that I myself do not.

Women's basketball is growing in popularity all across America. Many folks find it more entertaining than the men's game. But it's still not the money maker that men's basketball is. Not in terms of TV ratings and TV contracts. And not in terms of ticket sales or donations to universities.

The official numbers for the 2004-05 basketball season, as reported by the UT Athletic Department to the UT Board of Trustees, make this point very clearly.

The men were lousy enough to get their coach fired, but they still brought in more than $1 million net profit to the university (not counting the number of donations people made to buy season tickets).

The Lady Vols lost just four games all season, went to yet another Final Four and cleared about $25,000. (And that does include $1.18 million in donations given for the right to buy season tickets.)

Even throwing out the fact that one program counts donations and the other does not, the men's basketball program at Tennessee still brings in 43 times what women's basketball does. Forty. Three. Times. And the ratio's going to be skewed even more this season.

So how then can folks say that Summitt is underappreciated by UT? That she should go somewhere else that will pay her what a man makes? She's about to become the highest-paid coach in women's basketball. Tennessee appreciates her to the point of naming their court for her (which didn't seem to damage men's recruiting very much, did it).

She also makes a bigger percentage of the women's budget than Pearl makes of the men's budget. So this has bupkus to do with a man making more than a woman.

UConn's Geno Auriemma (who is the highest paid women's coach) makes about a half million dollars less than UConn's Jim Calhoun, despite the fact that Auriemma has won more championships and has a much higher profile. Those are two men. That's not sexism. One just happens to coach a big money maker. The other doesn't.

Summitt graduates her players, keeps them out of trouble, brings tremendous exposure to UT, and she wins more than anyone else in history.

Having worked with her on "The Pat Summitt Show", on pre-game pep tapes, and on Lady Vol recruiting tapes, I can tell you that there's no finer person than Summitt. I've dealt with a lot of coaches. She sets the bar for all of them.

But salaries come down to dollars and cents. Tennessee athletics is a business. And the UTAD has to use its dollars in a way that makes sense. So don't try to turn this into a case of "he's paid/she's paid."

No other business in the world would pay a manager overseeing a $25,000 profit equally with a manager overseeing a $1.14 million profit. None.

Does Summitt deserve to be the highest paid women's coach in America? You bet. But should she be paid what Pearl makes coaching the much more profitable men's program? Only those with an agenda, or a poor sense of business, would answer, "yes."

The fact is, if Summitt were coaching the men and Pearl the Lady Vols, Summitt would have the higher salary. It's the size of the sport that matters, not the sex of the coach.

John Pennington hosts The Hall's Salvage Sports Source on Sunday at 11 a.m. on WATE. He also writes a blog at govolsxtra.com.