Yahoo Sports: Notre Dame Under Investigation for Academic Fraud

B1GTide said:

What is worse, academic fraud by player or armed robbery by a player? The NCAA is smart enough to realize that a school cannnot keep a player from being a thug, but they are not smart enough to realize that they cannot keep a player from cheating in the classroom.

Again, I am assuming that the school was not aware and that they did not attempt to cover it up. Based on how they have handled this to date and how they handled the situation with their starting QB last season, I believe that this is probably as much a shock to the ND coaches and administration as it is to the rest of the college football world.

So, should the school suffer because they have cheaters or criminals on their team if they take appropriate action the moment that they discover the problem? IMO, they should be lauded, not punished.

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I can see your argument. However, the simple truth is it comes down to the academic fraud kept the players eligible. That is a competitive advantage. Therefore, the school MUST be punished, even after kicking the player off the team.

If the players had committed a crime, then kicking them off the team would be enough. In this case, ND has to face the consequences otherwise there's no reason to have rules in the first place.

colbysullivan said:

I can see your argument. However, the simple truth is it comes down to the academic fraud kept the players eligible. That is a competitive advantage. Therefore, the school MUST be punished, even after kicking the player off the team.

If the players had committed a crime, then kicking them off the team would be enough. In this case, ND has to face the consequences otherwise there's no reason to have rules in the first place.

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There is no academic "fraud" by the school to keep a player eligible - there is only cheating by the player. There is a huge difference, even if the result is the same and the NCAA is blind to the difference in thier rule books.

Cheating by Golson can be considered a one time occurrence, but when the other 4 were added to the mix I would argue there seems to be a systematic problem at Notre Dame. It is worthy of an investigation. Players cheating to stay eligible is a much different animal than players & students figuring out how to game the system to get money for books.

bamagradinATL said:

Cheating by Golson can be considered a one time occurrence, but when the other 4 were added to the mix I would argue there seems to be a systematic problem at Notre Dame. It is worthy of an investigation. Players cheating to stay eligible is a much different animal than players & students figuring out how to game the system to get money for books.

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Look, I don't like ND any more than you guys do. They are right in my back yard. But this was not just a player thing, and it was not related in any way to the Golson incident. There were far more regular students involved than players.

It is absolutely worthy of an investigation, and there needs to be one other than the one being performed by ND.

They clearly have a huge cheating problem to deal with here, but it is not a football problem. I imagine that this type of cheating happens at every school. I know that it happened when I was at OSU. I credit ND for tackling it head on and dealing with it instead of doing what we did at OSU, or what so many other programs do when they find something that could hurt their image or sports programs.

They discovered it themselves. There was no whistle blower here. They were not going to be exposed. They could easily have buried this. Even if you don't like them, you have to give them credit for showing integrity here, right?

Sorry if my repetitive posts on this subject come across as argumentative. I will let this be my last post on the subject.

impossible...notre dame is "good" for college football.

davefrat said:

impossible...notre dame is "good" for college football.

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If I had a $1 for every time I heard that. I don't believe it though.

bamagradinATL said:

If I had a $1 for every time I heard that. I don't believe it though.

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it's actually exactly the opposite.

the fact they are treated completely differently from every other school makes them a symbol of what's wrong with the sport.

CullmanTide said:

If the NCAA was willing to go back and make things right where there was injustice I might agree.

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I agree. The problem with the NCAA has always been being inconsistent with their penalties.

Catfish said:

Make fun all you want, but lets not lose sight of the fact that a girl who never existed is dead. :wink:

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If Manti Te'os girlfriend falls in the woods and nobody is there does she make a sound?

bamagradinATL said:

Cheating by Golson can be considered a one time occurrence, but when the other 4 were added to the mix I would argue there seems to be a systematic problem at Notre Dame. It is worthy of an investigation. Players cheating to stay eligible is a much different animal than players & students figuring out how to game the system to get money for books.

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With all due respect, there is absolutely zero evidence of school involvement. None. This is a self-reported problem, and as far as we know currently, strictly limited to students and student-athletes. Comparing it to the UNC scandal doesn't make much sense, as currently only 4 students were allegedly involved and there was no whisteblower.

NCAA case precedent shows that the NCAA only imposes penalties on a school related to academics when there is some form of faculty involvement or coach involvement. I.E. Minnesota in 1999-2000, USC 2001, Bama 2001. Even though ND voluntarily reached out to the NCAA to inform them of what happened, unless faculty was involved there likely will be no NCAA penalties. Vacating the wins would only be done by the university here.

FriendlyIrish said:

With all due respect, there is absolutely zero evidence of school involvement. None. This is a self-reported problem, and as far as we know currently, strictly limited to students and student-athletes. Comparing it to the UNC scandal doesn't make much sense, as currently only 4 students were allegedly involved and there was no whisteblower.

NCAA case precedent shows that the NCAA only imposes penalties on a school related to academics when there is some form of faculty involvement or coach involvement. I.E. Minnesota in 1999-2000, USC 2001, Bama 2001. Even though ND voluntarily reached out to the NCAA to inform them of what happened, unless faculty was involved there likely will be no NCAA penalties. Vacating the wins would only be done by the university here.

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And that is sad. IMO.

FriendlyIrish said:

With all due respect, there is absolutely zero evidence of school involvement. None. This is a self-reported problem, and as far as we know currently, strictly limited to students and student-athletes. Comparing it to the UNC scandal doesn't make much sense, as currently only 4 students were allegedly involved and there was no whisteblower.

NCAA case precedent shows that the NCAA only imposes penalties on a school related to academics when there is some form of faculty involvement or coach involvement. I.E. Minnesota in 1999-2000, USC 2001, Bama 2001. Even though ND voluntarily reached out to the NCAA to inform them of what happened, unless faculty was involved there likely will be no NCAA penalties. Vacating the wins would only be done by the university here.

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From what I read earlier in this thread, a university official was part of the fraud and had admitted to the same. Was this correct or not?

Moro Creek said:

From what I read earlier in this thread, a university official was part of the fraud and had admitted to the same. Was this correct or not?

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No. Right now most are saying that students and student-athletes alike were involved, but that no university officials were. If they were then yes, this is the ultimate disaster scenario.

There were rumors on the board I frequent (Irish Envy) that some student-tutor was involved, and she was dating some of the players. This is likely not true, but that's probably what you are referring to.