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Pac-12 reprimands Arizona’s Sean Miller, fines him $25,000

by on Mar. 18, 2013, under Arizona basketball
Sean Miller

Sean Miller’s postgame reaction to this technical foul cost him $25,000. Photo by Kyle Terada-USA TODAY Sports

Less than four hours after Arizona Wildcats coach Sean Miller said “We’ve moved on” from the tempest of the technical foul late in the UCLA game, the Pac-12 got in the final word.

The conference delivered a public reprimand to Miller Sunday night and threw in a $25,000 fine for emphasis, citing two postgame incidents as its reasons.

Neither of those were for Miller’s postgame “He touched the ball” news conference, but for confronting a game official on the floor after the buzzer and acting inappropriately toward a conference staff member in the hallway of the arena.

The conference also reported that Miller had previously been warned about his postgame conduct with officials. (You can read the full release below.)

As the news of the fine spread, former Arizona All-American Derrick Williams (after a career-high 28-point performance for the Minnesota Timberwolves, by the way) tweeted:

“Anybody else want to pitch in for that Terrible $25k fine that Coach Miller got ? Awful !”

Miller is more than capable of paying his own fines, of course, but at some point late Sunday night, someone bought the URL to millerfanfund.com, as well as hetouchedtheball.com.

Miller was asked Sunday if his fiery postgame comments might be a spark to the team.

“I don’t know,” he said. “I know this; our players, they don’t have to go very far to figure out I care a lot about them.”

Here is the release from the Pac-12:

WALNUT CREEK, Calif. — The Pac-12 Conference announced today that it has reprimanded and fined University of Arizona men’s head basketball coach Sean Miller $25,000 for two post game incidents.

The two incidents occurred after Arizona’s loss to UCLA in the Pac-12 Tournament on Friday, March 15th. Immediately following the game, Coach Miller confronted a game official on the floor, and then acted inappropriately toward a staff member in the hallway of the arena.

“The Conference has a formal system of evaluation and feedback in place for coaches to express concern about officiating,” said Pac-12 Commissioner, Larry Scott. “Coaches play a significant role in the overall officiating program and are expected to address concerns through the structure provided,” he added. “Threatening, intimidating and unprofessional conduct will not be tolerated.”

Pac-12 officials are graded on game performance. Future assignments are based on this grading structure as well as coach feedback. The Pac-12 previously warned Coach Miller about inappropriate, post game conduct toward officials.

“Even in tense and trying moments following a game, we expect Pac-12 coaches to conduct themselves in a professional manner,” said Commissioner Scott. “Our coaches represent their teams, their universities and our conference. We expect them to set an example for our student athletes and to meet the highest standard of sportsmanship and behavior on and off the court.”

Related: Javier Morales — Reprimands happen: Public action against Sean Miller also occurred with Lute Olson

This entry was posted on Monday, March 18th, 2013 at 12:47 am and is filed under Arizona basketball. Tags for this post: , . You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.

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  • http://www.facebook.com/kerry.szymanski Kerry Szymanski

    I suppose it would be asking too much of Larry Scott to qualify his remarks with, “the officials got that one wrong – it happens”. Bad enough to blow the whistle on a non call (the replay clearly shows there was no double dribble) but then turn around and add insult to injury in a crucial tournament game by calling a technical? Terrible officiating and perfectly understandable reaction by Sean Miller. He is human like the rest of us.

  • Fraser007

    I don’t have much money. But I would gladly kick in a couple of dollars for this one.

  • http://twitter.com/rxman11 Mike

    Thats bull@#*^!!! Best coach in Pac-12!! Passionate,caring!! love him as our head guy!! I’ve got a grand or 2 to donate!!

  • CarlosJM

    “…threatening, intimidating, unprofessional conduct…” Coach may be many things but he certainly ain’t none of those things. What Mom or Dad would allow their son or daughter to work for him if he were? And if the Commissioner saw fit to see It this way with Coach, how in the world does he explain the slap on the wrist, if barely, Montgomery got for pushing Crabbe? The quickest, surest way to harbor dissension, mistrust, a grave lack of loyalty amongst the ranks is to foster an unneven, caste system of punishment and rewards. Every parent knows this. Teachers, coaches, administrators steer clear of any appearances (let alone practices)of being anything but firm, fair and consistent. It’s a little more than surprising to me that Scott, the ahead-of-the-curve, trend-setting CEO of the PAC-12, doesn’t get this simple, basic principle of human relations and, quite frankly, human development.

    Anthony, with the PAC-12 governing institutions that are, for the most, anyhow, public funded, meaning you, I and just about all other readers foot the bill for much of what the universities do, including athletics, this would be a good time and place to post Scott and Conference Head of Men’s Basketball Officials Ed Rush’s contact information. Those,of us with an opinion one way or the other deserve the right to have it be written and put before these gentlemen. Them reading it may be another story, but that’s besides the point. I looked and the best I could do,is privacy@pac-12.org for an e-mail address.

  • macjones

    Hmm… Much ado bout’ nothing. Heck, any college hoopdom fandom KNOWS that the PAC-12/10 officiating been abso-LUTE-ly bogus for approximately 8-9 seasons now.
    Again, the PAC-10 did have some realtively consistent crews during the early years of the 21st Century and the decade of the 90′s. However, those individuals eventually RETIRED and the PAC-12 bubba is left with these INEPT, INCONSISTENT zebra’s today.
    By the way, Arizona better be playing at a LEGITIMATE Top 10 level entering the PAC-12 conference season next season. BECAUSE these various PAC-12 officials abso-LUTE-ly HOLD ” grudges ” and love nothing better than ” GETTING EVEN ” with certain conference head coaches!
    Bon jour et Bonsoir

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