I don't know if it's just me, but it seems like no one REALLY wanted to talk about the UNC investigations in the lead up to the Final Four and Championship Game. It was mentioned in passing but there wasn't really a deep dive into it. Ole Roy might get asked 2 softball questions about it and it moves on.
A year and a half ago, Roy Williams said he was worried sick about the NCAA's investigation. Now he says he doesn't expect UNC basketball to face any punishment whatsoever. Some have called this the worst academic scandal in NCAA history, but Williams doesn't seem concerned.
About 1.500 athletes take fake classes over a 20 year period (according to the Wainstein Report) and UNC hasn't really had to answer for it. Shouldn't this entire athletic program have been punished by now? Feels like people are just letting them slide. Am I wrong?
Comments
I still have a sliver of hope that the NCAA will bring the hammer down on them, but I seriously doubt they will get the punishment they deserve.
I hope that Nova beats them by 50 tonight.
This was the best headline I've seen:
Academically Sketchy Program Defeats Academically Sketchy Program, 83-66
There was a new story out of Raleigh, where they uncovered proof that a key component of the scandal (a limit of 12 hrs of independent study counting towards a degree) was in place well before 2006 (the time that the Wainstein Report was the start of this particular issue). The guesstimate was that an additional 142 athletes would have been ineligible, including several from their last BB NC team (incl Rashad McCants).
My guess: Women's BB will get hammered. Football will get a little (one year post season ban, 4 or 5 scholarships lost). Mens BB will get next to nothing. Just a joke.
They'll say "Roy wasn't aware of it". 20+ years, 1500+ athletes...he should of known. Think he went to the Petino school of denial. He's a joke.
NCAA is a joke. If they don't hammer UNCheat, they should immediately disband.
Further UNC should loose their accreditation...but they won't.
What they should get:
All teams involved forfeit all wins and vacate championships for all years listed in the investigation
Fines in relation to every postseason appearance by all teams involved
Banishment or suspensions of coaches involved, based on level of involvement
No TV revenue for a year or twofor the revenue sports
Loss of scholarships for a few years for all teams involved
No sense in future postseason bans. No need to punish current players for past player violations.
Hammer the fans too by limiting the home schedule of offending teams.
Let any player transfer immediately.
Do they return these though?
You are right on both counts!
First, yes, UNC should have been punished by now!
Second, yes, you are wrong! This tournament is about what the guys on the team have accomplished. As far as I've seen, there are no allegations that these players are guilty of the same transgressions as their predecessors. They've beaten just about everyone in their path, won the ACC regular season, ACC tournament, and have rolled through the all the competition that the NCAA tournament has thrown at them so far. In my opinion, they deserve to have the focus on their accomplishments and let the scandal resume next week.
Leg for the spot-on insight
Would you expect espn to blow up a story about one of their premier football SEC programs during the championship game?
No.
The ACC is the SEC of basketball. Espn isn't about to tread on the toes of the money makers
ESPN doesn't have the broadcast rights for the tourney, CBS does.
ESPN did broadcast in Canada on the highly-accoladed TSN channel
What they did was so bad that Cleveland St will be probation for 10 years.
The Onion has chimed in with its usual excellence
http://www.theonion.com/article/frustrated-unc-student-too-busy-studying...
Interesting. For this thread I get an MBA from Oakland University ad. Quite appropriate.....
Hahaha, I have no sympathy for UNCheat
Great game. The right team won
As a Hokie living in NC whose family is from Philly....
Yes, the last couple weeks have been awesome
As a Hokie from Philly, I also love this result.
I can not wait to see the crying Jordan memes the Internet produces tonight
What's even more tasty... The newscasters here in Raleigh are practically crying on air taking about this. They were fully prepared for a celebration and it blew up on their face. Didn't hurt most of them are alumni. The puffy eyes and choked up voices... Sometimes schadenfreude is truly fun to watch.
Man that Roy Williams presser was tough, though. Would not be surprised if he retires this year. Seems like he knew it, too.
Don't know if I'm more excited that UNC lost or that Jon Rothstein has the Hokies number 25 in his stupid early preseason poll.
Link??
Just on Twitter right now, and I can't do embedded on my phone, but here is the link to the tweet: https://mobile.twitter.com/JonRothstein/status/717200841762029570
That's alright, I found it. Thanks though
This whole investigation goes much further than UNC. It lays at the hands of the NCAA and it's lack of educational and academic stance. Love hearing Jay Bilas dish on how much of a joke the NCAA is from an academic standpoint. What happened at UNC happens at, or has happened at, nearly every school in the country. Is it on the same scale? Maybe not, but the overly excessive privilege, leniency , and preferential treatment towards athletes happens EVERYWHERE. The admins know exactly what classes to place athletes in in order to maintain eligibility. That's one reason why there are academic advisors specifically for athletes...
Does preferential academic (possibly shady) treatment happen at VT? I'd bet my house it does. The general college athletic academic environment is to do whatever has to be done to get it done. It's only when the benefit for the athlete runs out that they decide to take it upon themselves to try and take it down. UNC just happened to have former athletes blow the whistle and torpedo the ship. Fans generally only care about the end result on the field. Make fun of UNC all you want, but to have a notion that this is a UNC isolated incident is hilariously nave.
The worst part is that it spoils a school's academic image for the athletes AND the general student population who actually are good students, go to class everyday, do their own work, and realize that there's more to life than what happens between the sidelines. There are handfuls upon handfuls more of these types of students than the latter.
No show classes and fake papers graded by a secretary, I'm going to say that is a very isolated incident among schools. Who else would be that stupid to try that?
Key word you used..... schools. My point exactly. No show classes, yes, that's probably isolated. Someone else grading papers?? Yea right. I agree that the level of severity of these practices is largely isolated. But the thought that someone doing players' work and someone other than a prof grading an athlete's paper doesn't happen largely across the board is silly.
Its on all the major media sources
http://www.theonion.com/article/frustrated-unc-student-too-busy-studying-players-t-52684
n/m saw this posted earlier...well done
As much as it would hurt the ACC and therefore Tech, I really think UNC should get the death penalty for all sports. It was a systemwide cheating scandal that crossed pretty much all of their major sports programs. I do think punishing the players now for the fact that Julius Peppers cheated at UNC 15 years ago is a stretch, but it was a more than 15 period of wrongdoing.
Tinfoil hat time: I think that the NCAA is dragging their feet on this until after Roy retires, which they expect to happen in the next couple of years. It is also no coincidence that ACC Commissioner Swofford, being an UNC alum, may be using his influence to try to delay and/or deflect the hammer as much as possible. UNC getting the Death Penalty would severely impact the ACC, so he can say he is just doing his job by lobbying for a member institution.
"While Wainstein's team had difficulty determining a precise number of how many students were impacted, the report said more than 3,100 students received irregular instruction in the Afro and African-American studies paper classes. "While that number very likely falls short of the true number, it is as close as we can get to a definitive total without engaging in speculation," Wainstein's report said."
Read more: http://www.dailytarheel.com/article/2014/10/wainstein-report-reveals-ext...
Quoted from The Daily Tar Heel
The NCAA has limited powers of investigation and enforcement. The NCAA cannot force testimony with legal penalties nor criminally punish the offending parties. However, in this case of violations the state of North Carolina became involved and using the means of the state investigative/criminal system, was able to thoroughly investigate the actions. The legal door was open to the state when then tutor Jennifer Wiley Thompson steered UNC football players to sports agent Terry Watson, resulting in four charges of athlete agent inducement. As she acted outside the bounds of North Carolina law governing sports agents
Read more here: http://www.newsobserver.com/sports/college/acc/unc/article10080929.html#...
"In 2013, grand jury indicted Jennifer Wiley Thompson, a former tutor in the Department of Athletics, for steering UNC football players to agent Terry Watson. Nyang'oro was indicted in December for accepting $12,000 for teaching a class that never met.Both had their charges dropped by Orange County District Attorney Jim Woodall after agreeing to speak with Wainstein about their involvement in academic misconduct at the University.Woodall also agreed to forgo pursuing criminal charges against Crowder because she agreed to cooperate in the county's investigation. At the time, he said Crowder agreed to provide Wainstein information for his report. "That was absolutely critical," Wainstein said about Nyang'oro and Crowder's participation.He said all previous reports, while very well done, were handicapped by the lack of access to the two key players. "Without them, you couldn't really get these answers — the answers we needed," he said. Read more: http://www.dailytarheel.com/article/2014/10/wainstein-report-reveals-ext... from The Daily Tar Heel
Read more: http://www.dailytarheel.com/article/2014/10/wainstein-report-reveals-ext...
Quoted from The Daily Tar Heel
UNC and the NCAA Committee on Infractions will have a procedural hearing in Indianapolis on October 28, 2016. The hearing will address UNC's last response to the amended allegations from the NCAA, and not whether the infractions occurred. Side step.....the little side step. Intelligent people can prove and rationalize anything. Stringing the process out, and making simple things complicated will soften up enforcement.
http://www.newsobserver.com/sports/college/acc/unc/article105170416.html
Saavy universities have figured out that if you stall the NCAA long enough, then you can use the "other people did that and they're no longer around, plus you'd be punishing the current fans and students, and we've fixed it, and it's old news now" defense.
Are you referring to the alleged...
A) Fake Classes
B) Illegal Tutors
C) Impermissible benefits (Coastal Division Rings bought for each player)
D) Alleged Rape by Football Player
E) all of the above.
"