Mark Emmert calls UNC scandal ‘troubling’, ‘disturbing’, ‘shocking’
Oct 28, 2014, 11:29 AM EDT
Mark Emmert (AP Photo) Now that the Wainstein Report has been made public, the academic scandal that has hung over the head of North Carolina the last three years is now reaching the final stages. The NCAA is investigating the matter, and at some point they will be announcing what, if any, punishment will be handed down.
It’s an issues that the Tar Heel football and basketball programs will be anxiously waiting for. As Dan Wetzel so astutely pointed out last week, if the NCAA has any teeth left, they will be forced to bring the hammer down on UNC. Their defense in every lawsuit that is currently facing the organization is that college sports should be an academic endeavor first and foremost. They don’t have to pay the players for their athletic exploits, or even for the rights to their images and likenesses, because they should be just fine receiving an education as compensation.
UNC didn’t put in an effort to get these kids educated. They essentially allowed them to major in eligibility. Their punishment could end up being massive, and based on an interview NCAA president game to the Associated Press, it sounds like the NCAA is taking this seriously.
“Just based on the (Kenneth) Wainstein report, this is a case that potentially strikes at the heart of what higher education is about,” Emmert said Monday. “Universities are supposed to take absolutely most seriously the education of their students, right? I mean that’s why they exist, that’s their function in life. If the Wainstein report is accurate, then there was severe, severe compromising of all those issues, so it’s deeply troubling. … It’s absolutely disturbing that we find ourselves here right now.”
“When you look at what we all know today, the Wainstein report, and just based upon that,” Emmert added, “you look at the, I look at these facts, like everyone, and I find them shocking.”
How do you think the NCAA should punish UNC?
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- cavedan33 - Oct 28, 2014 at 3:55 PM
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I think since Dan Kane received death threats for bringing this scandal to light, a poetic justice would be the death penalty for the Football and Basketball programs, but vacating of the national titles/wins should happen as well, along with UNC returning all of the NCAA money it received for its “success”. UNC’s academic Fraud over 2 decades is on par with ALL of Kentucky’s (currently known) corrupt history. Not treating it as such would be a sport’s travesty.
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- tackandcover - Oct 28, 2014 at 5:58 PM
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He is “deeply troubled.” 18 years of academic fraud and he is deeply troubled. In NCAA speak it is called “lack of institutional control.” Time for the NCAA to impose some serious penalties and then make it clear to all institutions that penalties going forward will be even more severe. When the highest paid public employees in most states are the AD, MBB coach or FB coach it is long past time to get control of this monster.
