UNC professor blasts university and its athletic heroes in defense of Rashad McCantsl

http://sports.yahoo.com/news/unc-professor-blasts-university-and-its-athletic-heroes-in-defense-of-rashad-mccants-164401647.htm

"I'm struck by the profiles of those attacking Rashad McCants," Smith wrote in his email to me. "On the one hand, you have old-timers spouting off about their experiences in the 1960s, '70s or early '80s. These people haven't seen the inside of an academic support program in years, even decades. They don't have a clue what the program was like in 2005. Yet they hurl their venom at McCants – a player who had the guts to share his transcript on television, and who also had the guts to buck the tide while he was at UNC [an offense against ‘the family' for which he has never been forgiven].

"On the other hand, you have more current players willfully deceiving gullible journalists – while carefully guarding their transcripts – because they don't want to face reality and deal with the shame that the 'Carolina way' was no more than an illusion during their playing days. Antawn Jamison [who played at North Carolina from 1995-98] has the audacity to call McCants a clown? Someone needs to remind Jamison that [UNC-sanctioned special investigator] Ken Wainstein is actually looking at transcripts. Wainstein knows. And he's going to be issuing a report.

That looks like its going to be a good book. All I can say is the college athletic system needs to be over hauled and there needs to be way more accountability.

I think UNC is being thrown under the bus on this. Half the D1 schools would have the same issues uncovered if anyone wanted to talk.
But I don't feel bad about it and it is funny to see Roy Williams squirm and UNC try to villify MCCants and anyone that wants to speak the truth.
I think most of us are better off living in blissful ignorance rooting on our college teams. Once that facade is lifted and it is acknowledged that these guys are worth millions of dollars in revenue and should be paid as such I don’t know if it could keep its appeal.

Herbie Green wrote:I think UNC is being thrown under the bus on this.  Half the D1 schools would have the same issues uncovered if anyone wanted to talk.
But I don't feel bad about it and it is funny to see Roy Williams squirm and UNC try to villify MCCants and anyone that wants to speak the truth.
I think most of us are better off living in blissful ignorance rooting on our college teams.  Once that facade is lifted and it is acknowledged that these guys are worth millions of dollars in revenue and should be paid as such I don’t know if it could keep its appeal.

I agree. The end of college athletics could be looming if the whole system has to be overhauled.

Herbie Green wrote:I think UNC is being thrown under the bus on this. Half the D1 schools would have the same issues uncovered if anyone wanted to talk.
But I don't feel bad about it and it is funny to see Roy Williams squirm and UNC try to villify MCCants and anyone that wants to speak the truth.
I think most of us are better off living in blissful ignorance rooting on our college teams. Once that facade is lifted and it is acknowledged that these guys are worth millions of dollars in revenue and should be paid as such I don’t know if it could keep its appeal.

No, just a few schools. No one in the big 10. Btw. This is why unc was never asked to join the big 10.

Hut1hut2 wrote:

Btw. This is why unc was never asked to join the big 10.

  Yeah, that's why we invited Rutgers, and never rescinded the invitation.

Also, did you know PSU is still a member of the B1G?

Hut1hut2 wrote:

No, just a few schools. No one in the big 10. Btw. This is why unc was never asked to join the big 10.

http://news.minnesota.publicradio.org/features/199903/11_newsroom_cheating/

Herbie Green wrote:

http://news.minnesota.publicradio.org/features/199903/11_newsroom_cheating/

"The committee also was impressed, Friedenthal said, by Minnesota's willingness to return 90 percent of money earned from its participation in three NCAA tournaments, including the 1997 Final Four. The committee did not have the power to enforce such action, he said. The sum was estimated at about $350,000. "

So basically Minnesota wrote a check and paid off the committee.

Time to face the music, College sports has dropped down to a level where a good portion of the fans, the universities, the players and the NCAA are all big time moral cowards and disgraceful opportunists.

A new form of side contest has come about for the fans of college sports where a fan base watches a University or conference try to uphold the illusion that they run things clean, but then when a school gets busted and all the dirt and slime comes out the two fan bases compete in either trying to deny the scandal where as fans from the opposing school hope that the school is tarnished as much as possible.

Every major D-1 program lowers its admission standards to get athletes in. In some cases like UNC or scUM they lower them dramatically, but even at NW or Stanford or Duke, they lower them somewhat. Now - when you admit academically inferior students, the only way to keep them eligible is to give them 24/7 academic assistance and steer them into a major where they can survive. Nothing wrong with that, Adriean Payne is a great example of making this system work, if the athlete is willing to make the academic effort. But certain schools instead go the easy route...just get them admitted, and ask nothing of the athletes, just doctor the grades. That's what UNC, FSU, and others have done for years.

steveschneider wrote:


A new form of side contest has come about for the fans of college sports where a fan base watches a University or conference try to uphold the illusion that they run things clean, but then when a school gets busted and all the dirt and slime comes out the two fan bases compete in either trying to deny the scandal where as fans from the opposing school hope that the school is tarnished as much as possible.

Which is sometimes entertaining. I enjoy the comedy when a fan base circles the wagons. Although like in the case of PSU it can get pretty sickening

It's all smoke out of an asshole until some real change actually happens. Like The Drug War and the American political system, the NCAA knows it has issues but does nothing to change. It's the new American way: listen to the critics but don't respond with tangible evidence.

Herbie Green wrote:

Which is sometimes entertaining.  I enjoy the comedy when a fan base circles the wagons.  Although like in the case of PSU it can get pretty sickening

Everyone likes it until it is their own program they have to defend.