UCLA, Michigan, Stanford, Hopkins (D1 for lax), Duke, Miami, Maryland, Virginia…They can all set their own rules for admissions but their conferences don’t set strict ones like Ivy, NESCAC, etc. with the bands and AI. The athletic hook is not a back door. It’s an open policy that thousands of students use every year to walk right through the front door.
What made ‘Varsity Blues’ a back door was that the coaches and administrators were taking bribes to admit students as recruited athletes who weren’t really recruited and who didn’t play on the teams once admitted.
I haven’t followed the rules for a few years. There used to be a sliding scale for the GPA/SAT scores, so the higher one was, the lower the other could be. My daughter wanted athletic money and merit money, and she had a different requirement to get both. I think those rules have changed too.