Texas has the lowest Graduation Success Rate among football programs ranked in the Top 25, according to figures released Wednesday by the NCAA.

The defending national champion Longhorns' GSR, which is calculated by the NCAA, was 40 percent. The only Division I-A programs with lower rates are Arizona (39 percent), Florida Atlantic (33 percent) and San Jose State (32 percent).

The numbers were based on incoming freshmen from 1996 to 1999 graduating within six years. This is the second year the NCAA has released its own data. UT's football program also had a 40 percent graduation rate in the figures released last year.

The NCAA will release each institution's overall graduation rate next month. The GSR is separate from the Academic Progress Rate and can't be used to levy penalties.

UT senior associate athletic director Nick Voinis said the Longhorns' graduation rate is low in part because of former coach John Mackovic's last two recruiting classes. He expects UT's graduation rate to improve significantly over the next two years, when the figures will be based solely on players recruited by coach Mack Brown.

"Right now, the rates aren't as high as we'd like them to be," Voinis said. "We're working on it, but the future trends are in a positive direction."

Voinis projects that 60 percent to 70 percent of the players from UT's 2001 recruiting class will graduate within six years. He said 14 have already received their degrees, two more are enrolled in classes and several went to the NFL before graduating.

NCAA president Myles Brand is pushing to increase graduation rates to 80 percent among all athletes. The graduation rates for Division I athletes was 77 percent, an increase of 1 percent from last year's results.

The average graduation rate of Division I football players was 65 percent. Men's basketball (59 percent) was the only sport with a lower rate.

TCU was one of five Top 25 football teams with a higher graduation rate than the average of all athletes. TCU's graduation rate of 78 percent ranked behind only Notre Dame (95 percent), Nebraska (88 percent) and Florida (80 percent) among Top 25 teams.

Nebraska and Baylor were the only Big 12 football programs with graduation rates better than 80 percent. Texas A&M, Missouri, Iowa State, Oklahoma and Kansas also had graduation rates lower than the national average for football programs.

Staff Writer Chip Brown and The Associated Press contributed to this report.