NCAA penalties for Arizona: Big deal? No, but it could have been.
by Andy Morales on Jul. 30, 2010, under SportsNCAA penalties for Arizona: Big deal?
1. Vacate 19 wins from 2007-2008.
Big deal? NO.
Those victories will be vacated against Kevin O’Neill not Lute Olson.
Did Arizona make the Final Four that year? NO. Did Arizona win a championship that year? NO. Will there be banners removed from the rafters? NO.
Did fans go and see the victories that, according to the NCAA, never happened? YES. Will the teams that got beat by Arizona get victories from the vacated wins? NO.
Big deal? NO.
2. Remove stats for (supposedly) Jamelle Horne and Jerryd Bayless.
Big deal? NO.
Horne is no Richard Jefferson or Sean Elliott. Heck, he’s no Bayless.
He made a couple of big mistakes the following year that can easily call into question his basketball IQ and he will go down as a better than average player at a program where that classification falls short of greatness.
Bayless? Isn’t he a multi millionaire?
Besides, none of this was their fault.
Big deal? NO.
3. Loss of a scholarship for the next two seasons.
Big deal? MAYBE.
Does anyone expect Derrick Williams to stay for four years? How about Lamont Jones? Daniel Bejarano? NO, NO and NO again.
The “one and done” atmosphere of NCAA basketball has almost made the 13th guy on the bench irrelevant. Some coaches have even used it to give their own kids a free ride.
This could be a problem if every player stayed for four or five years and if they all arrived at the same time.
I trust Sean Miller knows what he’s doing.
Big deal? MAYBE NOT.
4. Six official campus visits for the next two seasons.
Big deal? If you have “ASU” across your jersey then it could be.
Arizona no longer begs for television exposure. Arizona has Kansas, Oklahoma and North Carolina State on their schedule this year.
ASU? Oh, they have a North Carolina team on their schedule. Unfortunately, it has an “A &T” at the end of it.
Other schools may tell high school kids, “Hey, Arizona didn’t use one of their official visits on you.” That might work for teenage boys who conduct themselves like a self-absorbed star on “Jersey Shore.” You know the type.
But, does Arizona go after those kind of kids anyway? The ones who have slipped in usually transfer out.
Big deal? Not for Arizona.
5. Lute’s legacy tarnished. (I had to add that one)
With the local media? MAYBE.
With the fans? NO.
Which group matters at the end of the day? The fans.
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The sanctions could have been far, far worse but they weren’t. It was almost as if the NCAA was looking for a way out.
Still, the NCAA could have completely looked the other way like they did with Corey Maggette and Duke.
In 1997 AAU coach Myron Piggie made cash payments to Maggette. The money came from sports agents.
Maggette signed with Duke and they reached the NCAA championship that year. Maggette skips town after his freshman year and is selected 13th in the draft.
A Federal grand jury indicted Piggie in 2000. One of the counts included payments to Maggette.
Both Piggie and Maggette admitted to the payments and Piggie served time in prison.
The NCAA has yet to rule on the Maggette case to this day even though Duke used an ineligible player for a whole year and made to the championship game.
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NCAA penalties for Arizona: No big deal.
