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Good morning, ladies and gentlemen of the Big Blue Nation, and welcome to the Tuesday Quickies. I know that all of you are excited for the advent of the 2016-17 basketball season, and if you are a Kentucky fan and the Blue-White scrimmage didn’t get your juices flowing and raise the excitement level for this season’s possibilities, you may want to dial 911.
Today’s lead story, though, is the recent release of the Notice of Allegations from the NCAA to the Louisville Cardinals. As expected, the letter was mercilessly damning, alleging four level one violations, including one of a failure to monitor against Rick Pitino. In case it somehow escaped your notice for the last five days, the NOA can be found here.
It’s sordid stuff, and don’t let the relatively low value of benefits alleged fool you — this is among the most serious NOA’s I have seen, though arguably not as bad as the one at Southern Miss that drew a 10-year show-cause order for Donnie Tyndall. The NCAA has distilled the moral turpitude that has drawn most of the outrage down to essentially a financial transgression, which I find rather amusing. But the underlying cesspool of NCAA lawlessness is reflected in the seriousness of the charges alleged.
Three of the four major violation allegations are directed at people who are no longer at Louisville — two at Andre McGee and one at Brandon Williams, a former U of L basketball assistant.
It’s that fourth allegation that has Cardinal Nation worried — the one against Rick Pitino himself, and alleges that he violated NCAA head coach responsibility legislation, and is presumed responsible for failure to sufficiently supervise McGee.
Nicole Auerbach has a good article at USA Today discussing Pitino, and this, as Frank Zappa would say, is the crux of the biscuit:
But we can still feel icky about it. And it’s OK for us to pin a great deal of this on Pitino, even if he didn’t know exactly what happened when it did. Of course a coach can’t know everything going on, but this is different. Pitino should have known about this; it’s his program, and these sex-for-recruit arrangements took place over a period of years in an on-campus dormitory named for Pitino’s late brother-in-law.
Indeed. Combined with the tawdry Karen Sypher affair of the wee years of this century, Rick Pitino has amassed a sort of libertine aura about him (and by extension, Louisville basketball) that arguably can’t be matched anywhere outside of Hollywood. At some point, most colleges would probably be concerned about that appearance considering the comparatively innocent nature of their patrons.
I don’t think Louisville will be, though. They have already said they would defend Pitino, and Pitino claims it was a case of him trusting someone, not a failure to monitor. He must’ve been too busy at the time to take note of Ronald Regan’s famous admonition regarding nuclear arms treaties with the former Soviet Union to “Trust, but verify.” Alas for Pitino, I think making the argument for trust as a defense against due diligence is unlikely to impress the NCAA.
I have no idea what will happen, but I am confident of a significant suspension of Pitino, at minimum. There are no dates or players unredacted in the timeline, so the matter of Louisville’s 2013 NCAA championship is still very much a concern. It is also possible the NCAA will find this too significant for a suspension, and slap a show-cause order on Pitino and Louisville, which would probably force the Cardinals to part ways with their Hall of Fame coach. I consider both long shots, but not out of the question.
Tweet of the Morning
Several reports say defensive leader Michael Scherer will miss rest of season with knee injury. Senior leads Tigers in tackles.
— Jen Smith (@jenheraldleader) October 25, 2016
Injuries are part of football, but they are killers.
Your Quickies:
Kentucky football
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Mark Stoops’ Monday press conference:
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Can the Wildcats take the next step, i.e. handling success? Certainly three wins in the SEC is a new level of recent success, and you can see Kentucky’s confidence growing. The question is whether or not that confidence is fragile, or durable.
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George Asafo-Adjei gains “or” status with Kyle Meadows at right tackle on UK’s latest depth chart.
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Mark Story says that Stephen Johnson II deserves more respect for what he’s doing. Maybe so, but until he stops fumbling the football, he’s not likely to get much more from the fans. Judging from Mark Stoops’ comments in the article, he feels the same way.
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Offensive coordinator Eddie Gran a big factor in UK’s turnaround this season.
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Bennie Snell and Austin MacGinnis earn SEC honors for their performance against Mississippi State.
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ESPN color commentator Rod Gilmore criticized Mark Stoops’ time management. Stoops suggested he lacked intelligence. Heh.
Stoops is right, though, it was five seconds between the first down and the throw that Dorian Baker dropped in the end zone. But five seconds is certainly one more play.
Kentucky basketball
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Sacha Killeya-Jones has John Calipari excited, and for good reason. I thought Jones looked terrific in the Blue-White game, and his ability to face as well as play with his back to the basket is exactly what every college program needs.
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Kentucky leads the nation with 24 players on NBA rosters. That’s only going to grow.
Other Kentucky sports
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Kentucky baseball will finally get a new stadium to replace The Cliff. Thank heavens, it’s way past time.
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Men’s tennis falls short in ITA regional championship finals, but the women were much more successful.
Links posts
College football
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Russ, son of Craig Yeast commits to Louisville. He was once committed to UK but withdrew that commitment this summer.
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Hazing allegations at the University of Virginia in the football program.
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Coach takes pee-pee on sideline, ubiquitous camera catches him in the act. Note: NSFW.
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Top storylines for each SEC team in Week 9. Consider:
Suddenly, Kentucky is resourceful and clutch in the most crucial moments, led by Stephen Johnson, whose confidence is growing with every one of these recent victories. He also has the running back duo of Benny Snell and Boom Williams to lean on, and this is a Missouri defense that just gave up 51 points to Middle Tennessee in a stunning homecoming loss.
College basketball
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No anthem protests from Louisville, according to Rick Pitino and his players. Good for them.
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Kyle Macy is now the assistant basketball coach at Transylvania. Great to hear.
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Two ETSU students get free tuition by hitting halfcourt shots at “Bluenanza.”
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The only way the SEC can change its perception in basketball is on the floor. That’s for sure.
Other sports news
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Archie Goodwin asked to be traded, but there were no takers, so Phoenix waived him. He’ll be picked up again eventually by somebody, I’ sure.
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Nerlens Noel underwent knee surgery yesterday and will be sidelined for 3-5 weeks.