I haven’t seen anything like it in my time around the sport. I knew it was possible, but still didn’t think it would actually happen.
A national title, no more. Vacated. No banner or other recognition of it.
Louisville Cardinals, not the 2013 NCAA champions.
And this might not be all.
Now we all know what actually happened. The Cardinals made a great run that ended with a thrilling 82-76 win over Michigan in one of the best national championship games in some time. There was a big celebration. And you can be pretty sure that some players on that team had nothing at all to do with what the NCAA punished the program for.
But there won’t be a record of it. There are only the hearts and minds of those who were there.
The NCAA denied Louisville’s appeal of penalties stemming from an investigation of allegations that a former staff member – who, interestingly, the NCAA investigators never spoke with – arranged for striptease dances and sex acts for players and recruits during parties at a dorm on campus from 2011 to 2015.
And this might not be the end of the hits for the program. That’s what may be worse, especially as Louisville interim president Gene Postel and athletic director Vince Tyra seemed to want to talk mostly about moving on. Tyra said in a news conference that this “brings closure to one of these situations”, and Postel said in a statement, “While we disagree with the NCAA’s decision, it is time for this university to close this chapter and move forward with a stronger commitment to excellence on and off the court.”
But it’s not likely to be that easy.
Vacating the national title is bad enough. But the program will also have scholarship and recruiting restrictions and have to forfeit what published reports suggest are probably millions of dollars through conference revenue sharing from the 2012-15 NCAA Tournaments. Those hits having a more lasting impact in terms of what they can do. And then there’s the FBI investigation into corruption, which is why there is an interim athletic director.
The FBI investigation isn’t a big deal for the program by itself, because that will ultimately snare individuals from a legal standpoint. But the NCAA is sure to do its own investigation aided by what the FBI turns up, and the results of that might not be pretty.
This is likely to hit the program harder than you might think. An interim head coach, David Padgett, currently leads the program. After the season, a decision on his future will come due, and this will complicate things unless the 2017-18 version finishes with a thud and misses the NCAA Tournament. Do they give Padgett a longer contract and remove the interim tag? Or do they look outside the program? Padgett has done an admirable job under the circumstances, but this is Louisville – a powerhouse program, and one that had a team many felt could contend for a national championship this year, although you can’t deny the distractions surrounding this team.
In theory, the job of Louisville head basketball coach should attract some excellent coaches. But given the punishment that just came, and the reality that more is probably right around the corner, some who might normally jump at the chance to lead them might only reluctantly approach it or back off entirely. Tyra, or whoever becomes the permanent athletic director, might think they can get a bigger name or more accomplished coach, at least under normal circumstances.
And no matter who runs the program, negative recruiting is sure to make it tougher for them to attract high-major talent for some time. That happens all over, especially when something like this has happened.
There’s an obstacle seemingly at every turn.
It’s understandable why those at the school would love to move on from this, even though they would surely love at least one more chance to appeal to the NCAA for what they believe is a more reasonable response. No matter how much they disagree with the penalty, they probably had an idea this could happen and didn’t welcome the thought of the PR impact. The reality is that moving on likely won’t be so easy. The memory of this is likely to last longer than the memories of winning the national championship that the records will now say that they did not win.
