I grew up in Amherst, Massachusetts. My dad taught at Umass. I attended games at the old Curry Hicks Cage where Dr. J once played. I travelled to Albany in ’96 when the John Calipari-led team was the top seed in the East for March Madness.
And yet…I agree with Charles Pierce writing in Granland about just how much Coach Cal is exactly what is wrong with college sports. He takes disgustingly immoral to a whole new level. And no one seems to care.
Calipari is sui generis in the history of basketball brigandage. He has taken two teams — UMass and Memphis — to the Final Four and, according to the official NCAA record books, neither one of those teams exists anymore. Their participation has been Vacated because it subsequently was revealed that (a) things were going on at UMass that made that program one small step away from being an actual whorehouse, and (b) there was some jiggery-pokery surrounding who actually took the SATs for Derrick Rose.
A lot of coaches cheat. A lot of coaches lose control of their programs, or don’t care to exercise it in the first place. But, in the history of the game, only one coach has had two Final Four teams taken down. This is a remarkable historical achievement. When Kentucky gets close to winning this year, I predict that nobody on television will bring this up, although I’ll buy a cookie for the first analyst who says, “What’s the over/under number on Vacated? I put it at eight months.”
–Grantland, “Top Five March Madness Predictions”
I also grew up in Western MA (South Hadley) After High School I worked for a few months at a corner Shell station 3rd shift. One night a BMW pulls up and a smoking hot black chick gets out and comes in. A minute later, the driver (John Calipari) gets out and comes into the store as well. I said “hi coach” he said “hi”. They bought their stuff and left. As a reminder, he was married with kids at this time 1994 and out with a hot black chick at 2:30 a.m. Nuff said!
I personally know guys who took tests and did homework for some of the most famous NBA players in history, in three cases, under the watch of one of the most respected coaches in history. I don’t want to out anybody so I won’t be any more descriptive but the point is that this kind of thing apparently goes on in many places, if not everywhere, except that some are better at covering their tracks than others. Despite their early season drame, that is one thing that is commendable about Syracuse, at least this year. A #1 seed that suspended… Read more »