Penn State Wrist-Slap

     The NCAA released its penalty report on Penn State
University this morning and while the media extols how
severe it was, I disagree.
     Let me assert right from the start that I am a SMU
alum and might be bias a degree or two in this matter.
    The NCAA placed Penn State on probation for five
years, fined them 60 million dollars, cut ten scholarships
per season for the next four years, forbid them from any
post-season bowl games for four years, deducted all victories
from 1998 to 2011 from the record of the school and coach,
and forced the school to be academically responsible to the
NCAA for five years. Severe, to be sure, but now let's compare.
   In 1986 SMU was dealt the 'death penalty' by the NCAA and
NO FOOTBALL at all was allowed during the 1987 season.
Players with eligibility remaining were allowed to transfer to
another school immediately and they deserted SMU like rats
leaving a sinking ship. With the few players left SMU decided
they could not compete in 1988 and voluntarily forfeited that 
season also. A Hall of Fame coach was brought in to help the
Mustangs return to college football in 1989 without success. It
would be twenty-five years before the Dallas school would have
a season worthy enough to warrant a post-season bowl invitation.
   The death penalty not only killed a proud program at SMU but 
also spelled doom for the historic Southwest Conference. Without
SMU on the schedule, Rice, Houston, Arkansas, Texas, Texas Tech,
Texas A&M, and TCU had to find games elsewhere. The frantic search is still being felt in 2012 as the other schools look for a conference to call home. 
   What did SMU do to warrant the death penalty? They paid a few student athletes to attend SMU over offers from other schools. When the NCAA discovered this violation of rules SMU was cited and put on probation. Some of the players that were not discovered in the first violation wanted to keep getting paid, and SMU wrongly
kept paying them as per their original contract. Bob Hitch, the SMU
athletic director at the time, even sent money to one of the players in a school envelope with his name on the return address. How stupid can a person be? When the NCAA discovered violations still being made at SMU the guillotine dropped on the Mustang program.
What happened at SMU was also happening at other schools in the
conference but they were not as blatant. Who do you think blew the whistle to the NCAA?
    While there was speculation about Penn State receiving the 'death penalty' I knew the NCAA would not duplicate their 1987 decision.
Penn State is the largest school in the state of Pennsylvania, and the NCAA does not want to lose the revenue generated by the big state schools. The University of Texas, Texas A&M University, and Texas Tech University have all been found guilty of the same violations as SMU, but were never handed as harsh a penalty. The gutless NCAA needed a small church sponsored school to use as an example for others and they found it when SMU suddenly was able to compete with the big schools of the Southwest Conference in the mid 1980's.
It was those same schools that turned in SMU when they lost out on the recruiting battles. They did do a better job of cheating than SMU, so history continues to point out the Mustangs as the only school ever handed the death penalty.
    What was the most serious offense? One school was guilty of paying players to compete at a Division I school against competition of an equal level. The other school guilty of harboring and providing a pedophile with a supply of young boys. Even the adopted son of assistant coach Jerry Sandusky testified he raped him in the basement of his home. Most of the other boys were molested in the showers of the athletic department of Penn State. There is no comparison of the two violations, but the NCAA made their decision.
    Considering what could have been... Penn State got off lucky!!