In the wake of Sport Illustrated writer Phil Taylor’s latest column featuring the heap of NCAA violations that highlighted the last year, I’ve decided to put my own twist on the many culprits’ distasteful future: they’ll attend Ethics University, a four-year institution dedicated to putting sleazy figures in the world of sports on a path of decency.
EU’s incoming recruiting class (obtained without even the slightest thought of a violation, of course) includes UConn men’s basketball coach and recent national champion Jim Calhoun, former Tennessee men’s basketball coach Bruce Pearl and Ohio State head football coach Jim Tressel.
Over the next four years, these college athletic scoundrels will endure the most intense academic schedule they have ever encountered, including classes such as Intro to Following NCAA rules, Theory of Winning Without Cheating, Telling the Truth 101 and Advanced Avoiding Excuses.
Mr. Tressel will most likely be the dunce of the last one, as he has proven himself as the worst excuse maker of the group. After knowing that several of his players sold memorabilia in exchange for tattoos, he didn’t inform anyone in his athletics department for over nine months. Come on Mr. Tressel, you think that will fly at EU?
Along with academics, the incoming class will be forced to showcase their goodwill in the Honesty Hoop League, where each player is required to honestly call out fouls and fess up if they touch the ball before it bounces out of bounds.
The target for this will be Mr. Pearl, who tried to lure recruits to Tennesse via excessive phone calls and lied about it, saying after that he learned it’s “not O.K. to tell the truth most of the time.” Don’t worry Bruce, the people at EU will make sure you tell the truth all of the time.
They will also be required to get some field experience by coaching youth teams in their respective sports. At the end of the season they will have to prove by way of polygraph that they didn’t commit a single violation in their recruiting of 12-year-olds. Mr. Calhoun should benefit from this, mainly because youth squads don’t usually have team managers like his that give recruits meals and lodging.
After the 2011 recruiting class completes their four years at EU, hopefully they will bring their new-and-improved set of values to their respective teams and restore what college sports should have been all along: ethical.