Basketball Bending
As an Aggie basketball fan, I have become recently glad that the program is heading in the direction it is heading.... and also less so sad that our former coach Billy Gillespie decided to bolt for greener pastures in Lexington.
Seems that BCG is getting a well-known reputation for finding recruiting rules loopholes at every turn... and one can only think that if these actions aren't illegal today, they probably will be soon. Also, these are the partially-legal things we know about... there could be rules infractions he's committing at UK that we don't.
But, for the partial rules infractions, the list is as such:
1.) Signing an 8th grade kid... most people think this is too early for a program to go out and get a verbal commitment from a player.
2.) Moving up Midnight Madness to get an early bead on recruits... I thought this date was set as the first official practice date set by the NCAA... apparently that's not true. Technically, Midnight Madness is considered a team practice... it's just open to the public as a huge pep rally.
3.) Giving the father of a top 10 recruit that he signed a little more than $4k in speaking engagements at basketball camps this year. It appears shady, but it's perfectly (I suppose) within the rules.
http://sports.espn.go.com/ncb/columns/story?id=3710807
These are just the things he's done this year at Kentucky... which is making me glad that he's gaining this scrutinizing in Lexington and not in College Station. After seeing Kelvin Sampson implode the IU Hoosiers program last year, I'd prefer that the damage to my colleges' basketball programs be limited to Bloomington... we'll recover there. College Station, in contrast, would not.
This is making me very glad to have Turgeon running the program now. He's run this thing clean and he's loyal to his kids. We have some bumps this season given the lost leadership and talent from last year (Dominique Kirk and Joseph Jones both graduating), but we'll be okay. We have a couple of outstanding freshmen from Florida that are growing into their roles, Josh Carter is stepping up as a leader, and Donald Sloan needs to step up into that role as he had in the UCLA game in last season's Regional. We also have a great class coming in next year. What I'm happy about limiting the BCG exposure is: if he was like Jackie Sherrill (our football coach in the mid-to-late 80's) who built the program but cheated to do it, then what train wreck were we heading toward with him?
I'd prefer to be a solid program that competes for the postseason every year and is a contender every 3 or 4 years than a perennial contender that has to cheat to do it. The cheaters eventually get caught; and it isn't pretty. Being that, as a Hoosiers fan, I'm not really lovin' UK (and the way that BCG left us, anyways... very reminiscent of Fran bolting Bama), I hope it comes around to bite him :-).
Gig'em Aggies!
Chris <><
Seems that BCG is getting a well-known reputation for finding recruiting rules loopholes at every turn... and one can only think that if these actions aren't illegal today, they probably will be soon. Also, these are the partially-legal things we know about... there could be rules infractions he's committing at UK that we don't.
But, for the partial rules infractions, the list is as such:
1.) Signing an 8th grade kid... most people think this is too early for a program to go out and get a verbal commitment from a player.
2.) Moving up Midnight Madness to get an early bead on recruits... I thought this date was set as the first official practice date set by the NCAA... apparently that's not true. Technically, Midnight Madness is considered a team practice... it's just open to the public as a huge pep rally.
3.) Giving the father of a top 10 recruit that he signed a little more than $4k in speaking engagements at basketball camps this year. It appears shady, but it's perfectly (I suppose) within the rules.
http://sports.espn.go.com/ncb/columns/story?id=3710807
These are just the things he's done this year at Kentucky... which is making me glad that he's gaining this scrutinizing in Lexington and not in College Station. After seeing Kelvin Sampson implode the IU Hoosiers program last year, I'd prefer that the damage to my colleges' basketball programs be limited to Bloomington... we'll recover there. College Station, in contrast, would not.
This is making me very glad to have Turgeon running the program now. He's run this thing clean and he's loyal to his kids. We have some bumps this season given the lost leadership and talent from last year (Dominique Kirk and Joseph Jones both graduating), but we'll be okay. We have a couple of outstanding freshmen from Florida that are growing into their roles, Josh Carter is stepping up as a leader, and Donald Sloan needs to step up into that role as he had in the UCLA game in last season's Regional. We also have a great class coming in next year. What I'm happy about limiting the BCG exposure is: if he was like Jackie Sherrill (our football coach in the mid-to-late 80's) who built the program but cheated to do it, then what train wreck were we heading toward with him?
I'd prefer to be a solid program that competes for the postseason every year and is a contender every 3 or 4 years than a perennial contender that has to cheat to do it. The cheaters eventually get caught; and it isn't pretty. Being that, as a Hoosiers fan, I'm not really lovin' UK (and the way that BCG left us, anyways... very reminiscent of Fran bolting Bama), I hope it comes around to bite him :-).
Gig'em Aggies!
Chris <><
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