Michael P. Murphy
How Recruiting Violations and Academic Misconduct have effectively marred the Amateurism of College Athletics and a Proposal for a Local Solution
IDST J497
Professor Timothy C. Williams
November 30, 2012
Fall 2012

Recruiting Violations and Academic Misconduct in College Athletics
Michael P. Murphy
IDST J497
Williams

The issues of recruiting violations, academic misconduct, administrative negligence, illegal booster involvement, and a general lack of University oversight are all problems that continue to mar the once highly regarded reputations of academic institutions across America. These transgressions, which occur at shockingly consistent rates around campuses nationwide, (committed by faculty, coaches, players, administrators, and alumni), are effectively compromising the sacred amateurism college athletics has maintained to define its culture and provide credence for its illustrious traditions for over a century. Ethical questions of this magnitude have been pondered by academics and legal stalwarts alike with great depth both at the local and global level for years. Several studies reflect that a substantial percentage of the “major” NCAA recruiting violations and cases of egregious academic misconduct occur typically at institutions where local administrators and financiers have created a “win at all costs” culture pertaining to BCS (Bowl Championship Series) football and the NCAA Men’s Basketball tournament. A handful of local schools sanctioned by the NCAA in the last few decades for recruiting violations and academic misconduct include the University of South Carolina, Alabama, Auburn, Georgia Tech, LSU, Tennessee, Kentucky, and Arkansas. Each year the NCAA collects its constituents: college presidents, athletic directors, and compliance directors (among others), to discuss the current “integrity climate” of college athletics. Sadly, these summits rarely inspire any tangible augmentation to sanctioning guidelines designed to dissuade the NCAA’s member institutions from crossing the line with their recruits. It is imperative for a uniquely staffed Congressional oversight committee to be assembled within the next five years, structured with specific mission to audit and perform a comprehensive overhaul of these guidelines or compliance directors and athletic figureheads will continue to turn a blind eye without recourse. Scenarios similar to what the country experienced this past year with Penn State and Jerry Sandusky, or even Reggie Bush and OJ Mayo at the University of Southern California will continue to occur; eventually, amateurism as we know it within the college sports landscape will perish and the storied legacies that have made college athletics what they are today will fade along with it. Recruiting violations and academic misconduct have occurred and been well publicized on numerous occasions here at the University of South Carolina, the most notable transpiring under Lou Holtz’s time as head football coach from 1999-2004. According to Eric Wills’ 2005 article “Sidelines” in the September issue of the Chronicle of Higher Education, “the University has accepted its punishment in a case involving the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA). In late August, the NCAA placed the university on three years' probation but said its football team can continue to play in bowl games and on television. The ruling followed an investigation that uncovered 10 violations involving recruiting and academic fraud during the tenure of Lou Holtz, the former head coach. The investigation uncovered other violations as well, involving recruiting, eligibility, and the university's lack of appropriate control and monitoring of its football program” (Wills, 1). According to a source close to the University, the most substantive violations occurred after a former senior athletics director ordered a tutor to give impermissible academic assistance to two football recruits. Even local institutions with such vaunted academic reputations as Georgia Tech are susceptible to illicit practices. Brad Wolverton and Rebecca Aronauer also reported in their 2005 article in the December issue of the Chronicle of Higher Education “that in November, the NCAA put Georgia Tech on probation for two years and stripped the institution of several scholarships after discovering that academic officials had inadvertently allowed 17 ineligible athletes to compete over a six-year period (Aronauer, 1). Frankly, two years of probation and forfeiting a few scholarships qualifies as nothing more than a “slap on the wrist” for Georgia Tech, as far as the NCAA is concerned. Other local cases were uncovered in Tuscaloosa when “the National Collegiate Athletic Association alleged that Alabama's football program was guilty of major recruiting violations, including academic fraud, paying cash for players and throwing parties with strippers. The alleged violations occurred from 1995 until last year, before the current Crimson Tide coaching staff was hired. But the allegations painted a sordid picture for a program known for winning national championships and boasting that it had stayed out of the N.C.A.A. doghouse” (AP, 1). Alabama is notorious for keeping their indiscretions with Compliance low profile and often escaping media attention, but clearly not in this case. In February of 2011, Ray Glier of the New York Times reported “that four days after the N.C.A.A. sent a letter to the University of Tennessee about the recruiting activities of the Men's basketball coach, Bruce Pearl, in September 2010, Pearl is alleged to have committed another recruiting violation. The university released the NCAA's official letter of allegations on Wednesday detailing the charges against Pearl and his staff, which are considered major violations and could result in sanctions, such as being barred from postseason events” (Glier, 1). Tennessee has been in trouble with the NCAA before and it will inevitably find them again, but the harsh truth at “Good Ole Rocky Top” is that no one really cares, as long as the Vols keep winning and generating revenue for the University. The aforementioned instances are just a taste of the kind of trouble SEC schools have created for themselves over the course of the last 25 years pertaining to academic and recruiting indecencies. Recruiting violations and academic misconduct on the part of University administrators are transgressions not limited to member institutions in the Southeast. These problems run rampant across America every year. A few well-documented cases have transpired at such institutions of great tradition including the University of Kansas, Maryland, West Virginia, Florida, Texas A&M, UCLA, Indiana, Villanova, Boise State, UCONN, Memphis, Colorado, Arizona State, and even Harvard. Sara Lipka, of the Chronicle of Higher Education, tells the story of how in 2005, blue-chip basketball recruit Chandler Parsons, received hundreds of illicit text messages every day from college coaches and boosters, urging him and even offering him and his family money to come play for their school. Consequently, in 2006 the NCAA was forced to weigh two proposals designed to restrict text messages between college coaches and their prospects. In November of 1996, UCLA was forced to fire their head basketball coach, Jim Harrick, after he violated an NCAA recruiting rule and then lied about it to an oversight committee. In a 2011 New York Times article, the Associated Press reported: “Arizona State's baseball team must vacate 44 of its wins from 2007 and is banned from the postseason in 2011 under sanctions announced by the NCAA” (AP, 1). The N.C.A.A. Division I Committee on Infractions ruled that “the former head coach Pat Murphy failed to promote an atmosphere of compliance and committed numerous recruiting and other violations from 2004 to 2008” (AP, 2). The penalties, many imposed by the university, include the reduction of two scholarships by 2011-12, recruiting restrictions and limitations on coaching activity during practice. The vacated wins include Arizona State's Pac-10 title and College World Series games in 2007. Murphy, who announced his resignation in 2009, received a one-year show-cause penalty. The committee noted the case is the University's ninth with major infractions, the most of any NCAA member school. Even at Harvard, the supposed mecca of American academic integrity, recruiting violations have occurred. Pete Thamel reported in his 2008 column in the New York Times: “Harvard and the Ivy League have said they will review the possibility that the Crimson men's basketball program committed recruiting violations” (Thamel, 1). The Ivy League released a statement shortly after an article in The New York Times described how Kenny Blakeney, now a Crimson assistant coach, visited two Harvard recruits and played pickup basketball with them during times when contact with recruits was prohibited. “One of the recruits said the visit occurred before Blakeney was officially hired on Coach Tommy Amaker's staff at Harvard, but it would still be prohibited because the NCAA would consider him a representative of the university” (Thamel, 1-2). Harvard was never sanctioned for the alleged violations in question.
In the highly competitive world of Division I athletics, coaches, players, agents, boosters, institutional members, and even parents often succumb to the temptation to cheat. A recent case drawing national attention involved the University of Southern California (USC). The case included allegations of cheating in football and men’s basketball by two of the most high profile student-athletes ever to attend USC. Heisman Trophy winner Reggie Bush, who led the Trojans to a national football championship in 2004, “was found to have accepted thousands of dollars in cash payments, airline tickets for his parents to attend away football games, a free limousine service, expensive clothing, a vehicle, free lodging in Las Vegas, and a rent-free home and cash for his parents” (Weston, 555) Tragically, Reggie Bush’s mother and stepfather were at the center of the cheating scandal: “they promised to deliver Bush as a client to prospective agents Lloyd Lake and Michael Michaels in exchange for free housing and the expectation of additional payments” (Weston, 556). When Bush declared for the National Football League (NFL) draft and signed with a different agent, Lake and Michaels sued to get their money back and thus made the allegations public. Similarly, the USC basketball program infractions case involved violations in the recruiting process and allegations that a booster, “considered a representative of an institution’s athletics interests per the NCAA bylaws” (Weston, 557) made payments to an influential AAU coach in order to ensure that O.J. Mayo, then the top high school recruit in the country, signed with USC. After an extensive investigation and hearing involving USC, the NCAA determined that the institution knew or should have known about these violations and that “it thus breached its duty of maintaining institutional control over its athletics programs” (Weston, 558). In a sixty-seven-page report dated June 10, 2010, the NCAA Committee on Infractions (COI) set forth “extensive findings of agent and amateurism violations involving the two key athletes. With respect to the men’s basketball program, the NCAA accepted USC’s self-imposed sanctions, which included a reduction in the number of scholarships, a reduction by one in the number of basketball coaches involved in off-campus recruiting for summer 2010, a reduction in the number of recruiting days by twenty days, and disassociation with Mayo” (Warren, 559). But the COI also ordered a return of revenues gained from Pac-10 Conference distributions for USC’s participation in the NCAA men’s “Final Four” basketball championship.
USC did not impose sanctions on itself as to the football program allegations regarding Reggie Bush. The NCAA, however, did it for them. “Finding USC a ‘repeat violator’ with respect to its football program, the NCAA imposed stringent sanctions, including a two-year ban on postseason football competition and bowls, for seasons 2010 and 2011, the vacating of all wins in which these students had competed (since December 2004), and a reduction by thirty in the number of football scholarships for 2011–2014” (Warren, 559). The NCAA also required USC to inform prospective student-athletes of the violations committed in these programs, of the probationary status until June 9, 2014, and of the associated penalties. Obviously, the NCAA rule violations require accountability and consequences. But university presidents must implore compliance officials to investigate whether current student-athletes or sleazy agents, and other unscrupulous individuals who associate themselves with an athletic program are the ones who end up paying for the sins of a few former indecent students. Innocent teammates on USC’s 2004 national football championship team now have their title vacated. Current student-athletes and incoming recruits who had committed to USC months before the sanctions were imposed, found themselves on a team much different from what they envisioned, and are not allowed to experience postseason bowl play. “Although the NCAA allows, with the school’s permission, juniors and seniors to transfer without sitting out one year- and several USC players have since transferred- incoming recruits and sophomores are bound and may transfer only if willing to lose an entire year of play due to the ‘one year in residence’ requirement” (Warren, 560). In addition, the NCAA can penalize neither Bush nor the agents. Life is not always fair, but cheating never is.
Consequences are necessary, and NCAA sanctions intentionally provide penalties for major infractions. Both external and internal officials must explore whether NCAA sanctions adequately punish the actual wrongdoers, or if they disproportionately impact current student-athletes. NCAA bylaws “provide for a process to ensure compliance with NCAA regulations and set forth a range of sanctions to be imposed where these rules are violated. NCAA member institutions agree to abide by this set of bylaws to ensure accountability and consequences” (Warren, 561). Arguably, an entire program is complicit by virtue of association with rule-breakers where there is knowing disregard by institutional officials. But NCAA sanctions impact entire programs, innocent teammates, new recruits, even conference members, and yet fail to penalize many of the actual wrongdoers.
The most prominent arena in recent years where recruiting violations continue to occur can be found within the FBS (Division I Football Bowl Subdivision). Specific violations are classified by the rules committee as either “secondary violations or infractions,” typically self-reported by compliance officials to member institutions; often carry self-imposed sanctions or the more egregious “major violations,” involving a student-athlete’s eligibility, which typically mandate imposed sanctions imposed by the NCAA. One proposed explanation for the rise in secondary recruiting violations in college football lies within the BCS’ formula for calculating rankings and bowl selection (most notably the national championship) and the introduction of the Harris Interactive Poll. Because the structure of the BCS exists only in Division I (FBS) football, the football-specific systemic changes that occurred in the BCS during the era of self-reporting secondary violations is of great importance. “In 2002, the quality-of-wins formula was adapted to the BCS computer formula, which awarded points to teams that played games against BCS opponents and was used to decide who participates in the BCS championship game and BCS bowl games. Quality-of-wins is based upon the ranking of the opponent defeated, which is decided mostly by members of the media, and the opponent’s conference affiliation (Clark, 2). In 2003, the first disputed football national championship since the formation of the Bowl Championship Series occurred when LSU defeated the University of Oklahoma in the BCS Sugar Bowl Championship game to claim the BCS national championship, while the University of Southern California (USC) defeated the University of Michigan in the Rose Bowl to clinch the Associated Press’ debated national championship. That same year, secondary recruiting violations vaulted to their second-highest point since measurement of this statistic began.
Controversy regarding the naming of the Division I (FBS) football national champions continued in 2004. In reaction to the LSU-USC disputed national championship, “the BCS developed the Harris Interactive University Football Poll designed to allow former university football coaches and media members decide the football rankings in Division I (FBS). During the 2004-05 season, the Associated Press withdrew from the BCS formula and decided to name a national champion each year without the influence of the BCS computer formula (Clark, 3). That year also proved to be otherwise noteworthy along championship lines. First, Auburn University (a member of the SEC, a BCS conference) compiled an undefeated football season, but was not ranked first or second in the BCS polls and therefore could not compete in the BCS championship game; the University of Utah (a member of the non-BCS Mountain West conference) compiled an undefeated football season and received a BCS bowl bid but not an opportunity to play in the championship game.
Following these two situations of increased competition for the BCS championship, the BCS Committee created a new ranking system called the Harris Interactive Poll “to help determine the two teams playing for the national championship in football as voted by former university football coaches, former players, and members of the media” (Clark, 6). Immediately after this increased football championship controversy in 2005, both secondary violations have steadily increased, and major recruiting violations peaked in 2006. Since the addition of quality-of-wins in the BCS formula in 2002 and the subsequent increased level of competition in the sport of football, both secondary and secondary recruiting violations steadily increased from 2004-07. The only comprehensible explanation for this trend is that coaches have begun to focus their most intense recruiting on the signing of skill-specific players that contribute directly to the scoring of points and generation of “quality wins.” Consequently, these “five star” quarterbacks, running backs, wide receivers, defensive ends, and cornerbacks are often the most hotly contested amongst college coaches, forcing some recruiters to introduce financial compensation or material goods incentivizing a recruit’s commitment to a certain university. Historically, statistics from the Journal of Sport Administration and Supervision suggest “impact players are often among the most economically underprivileged demographics thereby making them highly susceptible to manipulation and easily persuaded by promises of financial stability” (Clark, 6). According to current NCAA Division I (FBS) conference alignments, schools from BCS-affiliated conferences are more likely to commit major violations because they are the only ones permitted to win football national championships, and thus the stakes are higher under the Bowl Championship Series structure. BCS-conference schools committed 76.4% of all major recruiting violations from 1987-2007 with the SEC at the forefront, followed closely by the Big Ten and the Big 12.
After initial examination of the issue, it seems as though the NCAA is allowing violators off the hook much too casually, regardless of the nature of their violations. In most instances of recruiting transgressions or academic misconduct, athletic programs are being docked with a slap on the wrist in the form of a probationary period and the loss of a few scholarships. The NCAA must pay attention to arguments voiced in articles such as Brad Wolverton’s “NCAA Board to Weigh Stiffer Penalties for Programs that Break Rules” and exercise their authority to impose the “death penalty.” Wolverton writes in his July article: “the worst offenders of NCAA rules could face harsher penalties than ever under a sweeping set of proposals to be presented on Thursday to the association's Division I Board of Directors” (Wolverton, 1). The plans, detailed in a 72-page NCAA document obtained by The Chronicle, would give the association's Division I Committee on Infractions more leeway in using the “death penalty” and other severe sanctions against athletics programs that commit the most egregious violations. Teams that flout the rulebook or fail to uphold the NCAA's standards could see postseason bans of up to four years, a loss of half of their scholarships, and financial penalties that stretch into the millions. They would also face severe limits on recruiting. Architects of a potential Congressional oversight committee designed to aid in the policing of the issues faced by the current NCAA administration could also learn a few things from Edward Fiske’s June 1985 article in the New York Times: “College Heads Seek to Control Athletics.” Fiske writes: “stiffer penalties for recruiting violations and tighter control of athletic department budgets will be at the top of the agenda Thursday when the National Collegiate Athletic Association opens a two-day special convention here on ‘integrity and economics’ in intercollegiate athletics” (Fiske, 2). The extraordinary legislative session, ordered by the association's newly formed Presidents' Commission, reflects growing fears on the part of academic leaders that problems related to big-time athletics are undermining the reputations of academic institutions. “‘Intercollegiate athletics has become a Fifth Estate with a life of its own,’ said Lattie Coor, president of the University of Vermont and a Division I representative on the commission” (Fiske, 3). Delegates, including more than 200 presidents or chancellors, were scheduled to vote on a series of eight proposals. Of particular interest to the committee include the income and expenses of athletic departments: the inclusion of any funds raised by boosters must be under the direct control of the university's chief executive officer. Athletic department’s budgets shall also be subject to an annual outside audit. While scandals involving the behavior of college athletes are nothing new, the year 2004 was marked by numerous high-profile reports of misconduct in athletic recruiting. At the University of Colorado (UC), these complaints contended that alcohol and sex were used to lure football recruits to the university. Charges were amplified by the fact that at least nine women had alleged sexual assault by University of Colorado football recruits or players dating back to 1997 and three had filed federal Title IX lawsuits against the university. In response, the UC Board of Regents appointed an independent commission to investigate whether alcohol, drugs and sex were used as recruiting tools and to examine existing policies and programs in the athletic department and across campus. In May 2004, the Commission issued a report (the “Colorado Report”) documenting numerous specific problems along with recommendations to address these issues. These developments, taken together, provide important lessons for other campus administrators in their efforts to respond to problem behavior and create safe and secure campus environments. While the University of Colorado is certainly not alone in facing these issues, their problems and responses have been the most visible. Colorado’s experience represents a cautionary tale for campuses that have yet to proactively address potential problems related to athletic recruiting, the conduct of their athletes, and general student conduct as a whole. The toll for UC has been great, including time and resources spent in crisis response and legal defense; damage to the athletic department and university’s reputations; above all, harm to students who have been victimized. Student conduct issues of this nature are serious and difficult problems that 3cannot be solved overnight. However, research from the public health and community prevention fields provides lessons that campus officials can use to design, implement, and evaluate effective programs used to police their campuses. Despite the challenges of addressing these issues, it is possible for campus administrators to make progress. UC’s experience provides an instructive case study for administrators grappling with the complex issues of sexual assault and alcohol on their own campuses, not just among athletes, but campus-wide. A relevant and viable scientific approach that should be considered by a unique Congressional sub-committee will consider the nature and triggers of academic and behavioral misconduct on college campuses. Understandably, high-profile cases of student misconduct raise concerns among campus administrators regarding legal compliance and liability avoidance at their own institutions. However, immediately approaching behavioral issues from a legal perspective can lead to a narrow focus on laws and regulations. While it is essential to ensure that campus policies and programs comply with legal guidelines, these mandates stipulate only what is required. In recent years, legal scholars have begun to argue that an important defense against liability is for “institutions to take proactive steps to implement reasonable protective measures designed to foster student responsibility and reduce foreseeable hazards and risks in the school environment” (Langford, 4). To succeed in this approach, attorneys and policy-makers must also examine what is effective in achieving these outcomes. The question of effectiveness is answered not by law, but by science and the specific design of a variety of “preventative initiatives.” From a scientific perspective, programs are considered to be effective if they succeed in reducing or preventing campus health and safety problems. Unfortunately, there are no simple solutions for the prevention of such issues. Many campus-based programs and policies have not been evaluated, and the existing studies often lack rigor, limiting definitive conclusions. In addition, while more research is clearly needed to help shape effective approaches to problem behavior, every campus is unique and therefore even the best research studies will not yield a universal solution. Congressional sub-committee members will need to tailor the policing of their coaches and compliance offices to each University’s local problems, structures, and culture. Despite the sparse research literature on campus programs, however, decades of prevention research from community settings suggests a set of best practices for developing, implementing, and evaluating interventions designed to reduce health and safety problems. These lessons, informed by a mental health approach, have been applied to the campus environment to create a set of program-designed principles and a strategic planning process that can guide efforts to address proactively, the nature and motivation of student-athletes’ misconduct while also shedding light on how college coaches and recruiting directors justify their own violations.
While application of the mental health model to academic misconduct by college students is not new, only recently have federal agencies and experts called for its application to issues such as plagiarism, grade misrepresentation, academic eligibility, and course validity. The mental health approach consists of “a series of steps that includes defining the extent and nature of the problem of interest; studying the individual, group, and environmental factors that cause and contribute to these problems, both globally and in a local context; creating and implementing interventions to address these factors; and evaluating outcomes to determine whether problems were reduced and how to improve interventions” (Langford, 5). Prevention initiatives are intended to supplement rather than replace a potential legal sentencing or NCAA sanctions to academic misconduct and recruiting violations. While presented as a linear process, in practice, NCAA watchdogs will often rework earlier steps as more information is gathered and assessed. In addition, planning processes are most effective when conducted as a collaborative effort, allowing key stakeholders to contribute information and work in partnership on program design, implementation, and evaluation. The best mechanism to ensure broad participation is “formation of a coalition that includes campus officials and members of the surrounding community. However, some campuses initially create a campus-based task force and later expand the group to include community or national representatives” (Langford, 7). In the case of a member institution’s athletic department, the NCAA Compliance staff represents a campus-based task force and local field offices coupled with the sub-committee’s administration in Washington the community and national representatives.
A uniquely staffed Congressional oversight committee should be comprised of former university presidents, athletic directors, compliance directors, and divisions of the FBI with a concentrated presence on BCS campuses nationwide. The committee should be divided into five field offices. A New York office shall be established to zero in chiefly on the recruiting behavior of Big East/ACC member institutions’ men’s basketball programs as these programs represent an overwhelming percentage of the conference’s revenue generation. A second field office shall be established in Atlanta to oversee the activities of SEC member schools, with specific oversight concentrated within BCS football programs. A third field office shall be established in Chicago to police Big Ten/Big 12 member institutions with focus balanced between football and men’s basketball. A fourth field office shall be established in Los Angeles to monitor the activities of Pac-12 schools chiefly in football, but with a presence amongst their basketball staff as well. The fifth field office will represent the committee’s headquarters in Washington D.C. and will establish intimate partnerships with agencies such as the FBI, CIA, and the Department of Justice to troubleshoot various detection mechanisms and trend analysis as well foster relationships between University presidents and athletic directors. This oversight committee will immediately implement a “three strike policy” pertaining to “major” recruiting violations and “egregious” acts of academic misconduct. For the purpose of all member institutions, two “minor” violations shall represent one “major violation.” The first “strike” or “major” violation incurred by a school shall automatically warrant a 50% reduction in the number of athletic scholarships available to the current year’s freshman recruiting class. Additionally, the program in question will forfeit eligibility in any and all postseason or BCS competition over the next four years and be placed on probation for a minimum of four years. A second strike shall represent a 100% forfeiture of all athletic scholarships available to a given program over the next four years, an eight year disqualification from all postseason, revenue-generating exposure, and immediate termination of probation. On the off chance that a member institution incurs a “third strike” and the documented violations are found to be consistent with the language outlined in the NCAA bylaws reflecting “major or egregious conduct,” the sub-committee will be authorized immediate and unequivocal imposition of the NCAA’s version of “the death penalty.”
The current “death penalty” as outlined by the NCAA stipulates that: “if a fifth major violation occurs at any institution within four years of being on probation in the same sport or another sport, that institution can be barred from competing in the sport involved in the second violation for either one or two seasons. In cases of particularly egregious misconduct, a school can also be stripped of its right to vote at NCAA conventions for up to four years” (NCAA, 45). The newly established sub-committee would amend the enforcement eligibility of this rule from five to three major violations in a four-year span. “However, if the NCAA discovers a school to be engaged in a ‘pattern of willful violations,’ it can return to when the violations first occurred, even if they are outside the four-year window” (NCAA, 46). It also still has the power to ban a school from competing in a sport without any preliminaries in cases of particularly egregious violations. However, the rule gives the Infractions Committees of the various NCAA divisions specific instances where they must either bar a school from competing or explain why they did not. If probation, the loss of scholarships, or the forfeiture of postseason competition cannot motivate member institutions to take their NCAA Compliance seriously, the shockwave introduced to the culture and community of member institutions by “the death penalty” will undoubtedly provide the necessary evil to wash college athletics clean once and for all.
The NCAA is clearly unfit to combat these moral atrocities on its own; the administrators at the top must swallow their pride and reach out to the federal government, divisions of the FBI, and other appropriate legislatures of the Justice Department to aid in the reconciliation of college athletics. Everyone must be held accountable at every crossroads in the process, but sadly, a current percentage of compliance directors as well as University Presidents at colleges across the country wouldn’t know accountability if it hit them in the numbers on a 30-yard fly route to the end zone for an overtime win in a conference championship game. These men are concerned only with where the next million dollars is going to be allocated from to fund a new, state-of-the-art on-campus facility or support the Board of Trustee’s latest capital campaign. A uniquely staffed Congressional sub-committee will effectively eliminate “slaps on the wrist” for repeat offenders, be authorized unmitigated imposition of “the death penalty” in cases of “egregious misconduct,” and ultimately provide the rigid accountability and overall sanctioning expertise so desperately required to weed out the few bad apples currently muddying the landscape’s storied greatness and hallowed purity.