Mr. Belding would not have let this kind of test cheating scandal happen on his watch. Give credit to Derrick Rose for being a better con man then Zack Morris.There are bad losses in sports, none may have been as bad, strictly by the numbers as what the Memphis Tigers basketball team. The season doesn’t start for months and yet they lost 38 games and a tournament appearance in one day...not good.
The NCAA announced its decision to strip Memphis of its National Championship-game appearance and Final Four appearance along with the team’s 38 wins in 2008. It was found that after an investigation earlier this year, former Memphis star point guard Derrick Rose cheated on a standardized test to gain admission into the school. It is unclear at this time what it really means as far as school records or the record of former coach John Calipari . Essentially it is more about giving back the money that was awarded for that season then anything else. It does not appear that the University will have any other sanctions against them, just the bad press. It does not appear that the school or coach did anything wrong so there should be no other fall out.
Well, nothing wrong may be an slight over statement especially as it refers to the coach. John Calipari , who is now in Kentucky has had issues with kids at both his last 2 stops. Nice to leave two programs and be the Teflon man where nothing sticks to him. Few people even remember his issue at Umass and now he has skated right to the top to one of the biggest jobs in all college basketball. Marcus Camby took money from an agent and not this news with Rose. What he did "wrong" is recruiting kids that are easily manipulated into making bad decisions. Character clearly takes a back seat to skill. Coaches and athletic departments are more likely to look the other way if a kid can put wins on the board, money in the pockets and sales of apparel.
Lets call it as it is - saying that a team is stripped of wins means very little. The kids that won those games know they won - you can’t tell them it didn’t happen. All I can say is it was a good thing that they choked away that game and lost to Kansas, stripping a team of a National Championship could have been an ugly and messy process and one that would have been met with a lot more hostility then what this case will have.
These kids are going to these schools to be athletes not for an education anyway. They know that they can’t go straight to the pros so it is just a place to kill time between games and when they can go pro and start cashing the cheques.
The NCAA announced its decision to strip Memphis of its National Championship-game appearance and Final Four appearance along with the team’s 38 wins in 2008. It was found that after an investigation earlier this year, former Memphis star point guard Derrick Rose cheated on a standardized test to gain admission into the school. It is unclear at this time what it really means as far as school records or the record of former coach John Calipari . Essentially it is more about giving back the money that was awarded for that season then anything else. It does not appear that the University will have any other sanctions against them, just the bad press. It does not appear that the school or coach did anything wrong so there should be no other fall out.
Well, nothing wrong may be an slight over statement especially as it refers to the coach. John Calipari , who is now in Kentucky has had issues with kids at both his last 2 stops. Nice to leave two programs and be the Teflon man where nothing sticks to him. Few people even remember his issue at Umass and now he has skated right to the top to one of the biggest jobs in all college basketball. Marcus Camby took money from an agent and not this news with Rose. What he did "wrong" is recruiting kids that are easily manipulated into making bad decisions. Character clearly takes a back seat to skill. Coaches and athletic departments are more likely to look the other way if a kid can put wins on the board, money in the pockets and sales of apparel.
Lets call it as it is - saying that a team is stripped of wins means very little. The kids that won those games know they won - you can’t tell them it didn’t happen. All I can say is it was a good thing that they choked away that game and lost to Kansas, stripping a team of a National Championship could have been an ugly and messy process and one that would have been met with a lot more hostility then what this case will have.
These kids are going to these schools to be athletes not for an education anyway. They know that they can’t go straight to the pros so it is just a place to kill time between games and when they can go pro and start cashing the cheques.
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