The University of North Carolina is under investigation by the NCAA for violations so grossly unethical that, if they are found guilty, their punishment should be proportionately severe. The investigation was spurred by a report from former U.S. Department of Justice official Kenneth Wainstein who found that the school had conspired to commit academic fraud for almost twenty years, involving over 3,100 students. More precisely: Allegedly, North Carolina athletics, from Dean Smith through Roy Williams, knowingly allowed over 1,500 of their “student-athletes” to pass through their school in an African and Afro-American Studies program that required absolutely nothing of them. They didn’t read, write, or do math. Nothing. Even in an age when the grotesque has become commonplace, we’ve got to be staggered by this remarkably unethical collusion to cheat. If they're found guilty of these allegations, what penalties should North Carolina face? The punishment, as they say, should fit the crime. Let’s look at the NCAA infractions and subsequent penalties at Maryland, Indiana and Ohio State to see if we can come up with an answer to that question.
The University of Maryland has got to be looking long and hard at North Carolina’s situation, considering the punishment served out to the Terrapins following Coach Bob Wade’s tenure in the late 1980’s. The most grievous violations Wade committed were that he gave $272 and a ride in a car to a recruit, Rudy Archer. He also gave recruits Alonzo Mourning and Brian Williams a discount on some clothes. Essentially, that’s it. And the punishment? Maryland was forced to return the 407 thousand dollars it had earned from the 1988 NCAA basketball tournament, they were banned from post season play in both 1991 and 1992, they could notappear on television for a year, and they could not compete in the ACC tournament in 1991. A ride in a car, some discounted clothes, and the program was ruined for three years.
At Indiana, Kelvin Sampson was the basketball coach from 2006-08. During that time he violated rules regarding recruiting over the telephone. He made ten impermissible conference calls to recruits, his assistant made thirty-five, and then they mislead NCAA officials during the ensuing investigation. Rule breaking? To be sure. The penalties were a public reprimand and censure, three years probation, a reduction of a men’s basketball scholarship, reduction in campus recruiting visits by athletes and recruiting trips by head and assistant coaches. The net result essentially was the loss of a competitive men’s basketball program for the following three years, during which time Indiana went 28-66. Excessive telephone calls and the program was destroyed for three years.
In 2010, it was discovered that players from the Ohio State football 2009 Rose Bowl champion team had sold football jerseys and rings for $14,000 and received some discounted tattoo work. The property that was sold belonged to the players, but an investigation was nevertheless launched by the NCAA. Football coach Jim Tressel tried to protect his program and mislead the investigators. That is the extent of the violations: Selling stuff, getting cheap tattoos and lying about it. Their penalties? A one year bowl ban, Tressel lost his job, and the players involved couldn’t play for five games to start the 2011 season.
Let’s go back and take a comparative look at the charges leveled against North Carolina. These weren’t hats given to recruits. They weren’t phone calls Dean Smith made to Michael Jordan. They weren’t national championship rings Sean May and Eric Montross sold to fans. Far, far from it, according to the initial investigation. This was two decades of fraudulently cheating students of an education (both athletes and non-athletes), of teaching the most unethical of behaviors to the students involved, not to mention allowing players to play who may well not have been eligible otherwise. Given the penalties doled out to Maryland, Indiana and Ohio State, it seems fair that North Carolina should forfeit all of the national championships won during the two decades with a shadow curriculum, and they should have to make financial reparations to the students whom they cheated out of an education. Perhaps then the university could learn to concentrate on what should have been their primary mission all along: education. It looks very much like North Carolina is telling the truth about one thing: When they say they have no class, they mean it.
Haldon Richardson is a teacher and a writer for sportsblog.com. Please like him on Facebook at: https://www.facebook.com/... on Google + at: https://plus.google.com/... and on twitter at: https://twitter.com/...