When Robert Hemenway mentioned to me he would soon embark on a 10-day trip to China and the Far East, I offered the Kansas University chancellor what I thought was a bit of good news.

“One billion Chinese,” I told him, “don’t give a hoot about J.R. Giddens.”

“Actually,” Hemenway replied, “the population is 1.3 billion now.”

I stand corrected. Hemenway also will visit South Korea and Taiwan during his junket, and, however many people live in those countries, they surely don’t care about Giddens, either.

In other words, Hemenway should enjoy a brief respite from the main topic of conversation on Mount Oread and its environs these days: the May 19 stabbing of KU basketball player Giddens outside a local oasis.

Perception is everything for a university, and it’s no secret KU has taken a hit from the Giddens incident and its expansive media coverage. How big a blow to the school’s reputation is difficult to gauge. Hemenway certainly can’t put a finger on the damage, yet he isn’t overly concerned about a long-lasting impact to the school’s prestige.

“I don’t think it’s been affected much,” Hemenway said. “I don’t think it has helped, but I don’t think it has done irreparable harm, either.”

If you’re wondering if Hemenway, in his role as campus buck-stopper, has intervened in any way, the answer is no. He is delegating the authority to athletic director Lew Perkins and to men’s basketball coach Bill Self.

“My comment would be that it would be the same as Bill’s and Lew’s,” he said. “They’ve done the right thing, to wait and get the police reports. And you want to make sure student-athletes aren’t subjected to danger. You want to make sure there are standards.”

It probably is safe to say that in the wake of the Giddens incident, KU student-athletes who choose to participate in Lawrence nightlife in the future will find the Giddens stabbing has afforded them less room to wiggle and more reason to watch their P’s and Q’s.

On another front, you may have noticed late last week that Hemenway has been named to a new NCAA presidential task force to study the future of college sports. Moreover, you may have seen that Hemenway, who completed a three-year term as chair of the NCAA Division One board of directors in April, also was tapped for the Fiscal Responsibility subcommittee.

Fiscal Responsibility. That must have brought a chuckle or two from detractors who believe Hemenway is one of those responsible for athletic-department budgets growing at a much faster rate than university budgets as a whole. And here Hemenway is on a committee charged with putting the reins on athletic spending.

“Clearly, there is considerable concern over the amount of money spent on intercollegiate athletics,” Hemenway said. “The problem is, you want to be competitive. KU is an example. For a long time, we weren’t competitive.”

The C-word is why Hemenway brought the pragmatic Perkins to Lawrence nearly two years ago. The Jayhawks were buried in the Big 12 Conference, lagging in facilities and treading revenue water.

“If we were going to be in the Big 12 Conference, we wanted to be competitive,” Hemenway said. “We didn’t want to be the doormat.”

Three and four years ago, Kansas was scraping bottom in Big 12 all-sports compilations. The Jayhawks still are in the second division, but at least they’ve shown some improvement.

Yet, as Hemenway said, Kansas is just an example. Scores of other schools are spending more and more money in an attempt to become competitive, and you have to wonder what brakes can be placed on a runaway train. You have to wonder, too, what the Fiscal Responsibility subcommittee possibly can do to slow a market-driven locomotive.

Hemenway’s journey to the Far East will prevent him from attending the first presidential task force meetings today and Friday in Tucson, Ariz., but he has been briefed, and he knows the subcommittee will hear from two economists who have studied the paradox.

“My own observation,” the KU chancellor said, “is it’s not just money that makes you competitive. If that was true, then Nebraska and Texas would win everything.”

Money may not be everything, but don’t expect any strategic arms-race limitation treaties in college athletics anytime soon.