I had just spent a few days in Atlanta attending the PGA Championship when the talk of conference expansion had crept back into the conscience of college football fans. This time it was Texas A&M seeking membership to the Southeastern Conference. If you want to fill time on message boards, radio shows, twitter feeds, facebook statuses, mention conference realignment and you will set off a frenzy.
I remember stepping off the plane at Reagan Airport where I was a greeted with a ESPN breaking news text that Texas A&M was moving to the SEC and that Missouri, Florida State and Clemson were likely to follow. I was excited and nervous at the same time. Lets not BS, I was pumped!!! Trips to the Swamp, playing Georgia every year, the South Carolina game would become a conference game, trips every now and then to Tiger Stadium, a trip to the Grove were all dancing through my head.
Being the irrational fan that we all tend to be, I began contriving just how Clemson could make it to Atlanta and how awesome it would be to watch my Tigers run onto the field to take on a Western Division foe for a chance for a trip to the Sugar Bowl or National Title game. I was quickly awakened from my drunken like stupor when I allowed an ounce of reality creep into my delusions of grandeur.
I have gone back and forth about how a potential move to the SEC would impact Clemson football. The trips to SEC venues would be fun. I have be real, if think life is frustrating during the fall as a member of the ACC, having not won an ACC Title since 1991, finding my team missing the ACC Championship Game countless years by one game, life in the SEC is not going to be much better. Overnight Clemson goes from being in the conversation to Mississippi State and Ole Miss overnight. Mississippi State had a nice run in the 90s but paid dearly for it with probation and Ole Miss with Eli Manning under center was unable to knock down the door to the SEC title game.
Another factor most Clemson fans forget about is the 10 plus year drive by the current president and administration at Clemson towards a goal of reaching Top 20 status as a public institution. Clemson fans who follow recruiting will remember Dwight Jones and Jheraine Boyd being one time Clemson commits but ending up at UNC because they would have not have been granted admission to Clemson. You see where I am going with this.
Speaking of our Tar Heel comrades, I came across an article found on the Charlotte Observer website that brought to light the lengths our friends in Chapel Hill were taking in an effort to win big in football. I will let you read the article to get all the gory details but it turns out that former Tar Heel defensive tackle Marvin Austin, yes the guy who was at the center of the agent scandal, was enrolled in a 400-level African American Studies seminar class during his first summer at UNC. The article notes that Austin’s alleged score on the SAT writing section required him to enroll in a remedial writing class before proceeding with further class work.
As most know, 400-level course work entails upper level study, that often includes extensive reading and writing assignments. At the University of North Carolina a “student” who needed remedial writing was enrolled in a seminar level course? The same University of North Carolina that loves to flaunt its self proclaimed academic supremacy allowed its academic pedigree to be sold to the devil in the name of winning?
I will be the first one to tell you that I want to win as much as any one. I will tell you that under no circumstances should a student-athlete be admitted to the University of North Carolina and not Clemson. Under no circumstances should any freshman let alone one with the apparent academic deficiencies of those comparable to those demonstrated by Austin be enrolled as a first time university student in a 400-level class.
According to the article Austin went on to earn a B+ in the class. For real? While by the time I was an upper classman taking upper level seminar courses in my interest areas were relatively easy in that I was able to do well because I had a genuine interest for the subject matter but more importantly I had developed the high level thinking and writing skills necessary to demonstrate proficiency in the class. Two takeaways, I was an upper classman and had developed the skills and knowledge to complete the class while maintaining academic integrity.
I am not accusing Austin of cheating but I am calling the University of North Carolina administration to task in allowing this to happen. It is this article that sealed my opinion on any move to the SEC. Not no but HECK NO!!
I am not carrying water for President Barker. I will leave my thoughts on him for another day. However, to compete in the SEC. This is the type of stuff that goes on likely on a systemic level with football players and other athletes. I get it, many student athletes are granted admissions to institutions they would not otherwise be granted admissions if it were not for their superior athletic prowess. However, you cross the line when you completely jeopardize the academic integrity of an institution by enrolling a student in a course that if graded as typical student he or she would likely fail miserably is just wrong.
Yes, I am envious of the SEC with their on the field success. But SEC schools are running borderline prostitution rings in their football programs in the name of winning. Apparently, the some of our ACC colleagues were trying to model themselves after the SEC in the name of victories. I know wins in football can prove lucrative for an institution and I want to win as much as anybody but not at the cost of another human being. My perspective after spending time on the inside of a D1 football program is different, I see college athletes as human beings, not mercenaries who are forgotten when their eligibility is up.
Clemson has a lot of be proud of with the advent of Vickery Hall and the academic support it offers athletes. Clemson’s APR and graduation rates have been in the upper third of the ACC and the nation. Somewhere within the halls of the Clemson administration they see athletes as people who will ultimately, “go pro in something else other than sports.” In order to be competitive Clemson would have to take steps that would greatly undermine the integrity of the university with practices similar to those taken by UNC and likely a step further with the creation of jock majors.
Maybe I am getting older but I am just not comfortable with that reality. As long as the ACC maintains a BCS automatic birth and the conference remains moderately viable to the point where Clemson is able to recruit and graduate upper echelon athletes, I am ok with remaining in the ACC. The ACC remains winnable and I believe real steps have been taken to make Clemson a viable competitor within the conference for the next several years.
I just cannot support a move to the SEC. I can’t sign off on having my degree put in jeopardy because of a game. Maybe other institutions are comfortable with such a move but I am not.
Disclaimer: I am not fully aware of the current class enrollment polices at Clemson for student athletes. If I were to become aware of such practices as noted in the Charlotte Observer article, I would be sure to reevaluate my status as a financial supporter of Clemson and IPTAY. I would bring such practices to the public light. I also realize that any invite to the SEC for Clemson would likely be blocked by South Carolina, Georgia and Florida.
No comments:
Post a Comment