Welcome to the latest edition of Talking Hoops With Ted Sarandis. As the off-season with much uncertainty continues, some important developments came up in recent days.
The first item of discussion concerns Kansas and the allegations against their program, as the NCAA enforcement staff sent a 92-page reply to the school that, simply put, pulls no punches. It sounds as though the NCAA is ready to hit the program hard, as it maintains allegations of five Level I violations along with two more Level II and one Level III violation. The case might go through the new independent accountability resolutions process (IARP), though there is risk in going that route.
From there we segue into Louisville receiving a Notice of Allegations from the NCAA coming out of the FBI investigation. This was not a surprise, but unlike with Kansas, it’s not a given what the outcome could possibly be. Unlike Kansas, Louisville’s head coach and athletic director from the time this happened are long gone; the school fired Rick Pitino as the news of the FBI investigation broke. Some of the risk in this now goes to Iona, where Pitino is the new head coach.
Additionally, we come to news that the NCAA upheld its previous findings with regard to fired UConn head coach Kevin Ollie. With that, they are also keeping intact the three-year show-cause he was handed. You have to think this will help UConn as they try to avoid paying Ollie the nearly $10 million he is owed under his contract, and that will help a little bit as they try to close a massive budget deficit that is surely only getting worse as a result of the current pandemic.
We go on to talk about a surprising move and its after-effects. Wake Forest fired Danny Manning recently, replacing him with former East Tennessee State head coach Steve Forbes. It looked like Manning would get another year in Winston-Salem, especially given what has been thought to be a hefty buyout, but late in the game by most standards, the school sent him packing. After that, big man Olivier Sarr opted to transfer to Kentucky, and a comment Forbes made in a radio interview probably isn’t going over very well with Kentucky fans.
After that, we go on to some of the belt-tightening going on at a few schools, especially in light of Wake Forest having to pay a big buyout and facing other revenue pressures, along with a book recommendation and some good words for a friend and colleague who has been let go from his long-time newspaper.
We hope you enjoy the podcast and share it with your fellow college basketball fans. Be sure to tune in again soon as we talk more about college basketball.
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