Sit Out Bowl Today, Build For Tomorrow

At 6-5 and at best 7-5 should Miami beat Boston College this weekend, it’s still a no-brainer that the Hurricanes self-impose a bowl ban for the 2011 season.

Had UM gone 10-2 or 9-3 you can entertain talk about a post-season berth being a “reward” and odds are Miami wouldn’t have given up the money or a more prestigious bowl. But when five or six games are lost and you’re clinging to hope in late November that you’ll even be bowl eligible, there shouldn’t be any talk of a reward being taken away.

Instead, you go the other route, throwing short-term completely out the window and instead choosing to focus on long-term. Head coach Al Golden wanted to see his kids reach a bowl and there’s no doubt that the extra fifteen post-regular season practices would’ve been beneficial. But regarding the overall bigger picture, this is the best play. Especially considering at best, Miami was looking at an Independence Bowl match-up against Wyoming or San Diego State in Shreveport on December 26th.

While other coaches are focused on a bowl game, Golden and staff can now go full bore on the recruiting front. Furthermore, they can do so with the ammunition that by sitting out a bowl game in 2011, odds are than any future Canes won’t miss a post-season during their time at “The U”. That’s not much solace for this year’s squad, but hopefully it’s something everyone can be made to understand.

Some have taken pity on the seniors, which is understandable, but that disappointment itself also needs to be tempered. The Class of 2008 will leave Coral Gables, at best 30-21 with a win this Friday – three of those losses coming in the post-season. Outside of a nine-win season as sophomores in 2009, this top-ranked class will have had three seven-win seasons.

Furthermore, when you look back at the Nevin Shapiro scandal which set this season off on the wrong foot, several seniors and team leaders were implicated. Jacory Harris. Sean Spence. Marcus Forston. Travis Benjamin.

Yes, all the allegations took place when these guys were impressionable freshmen and yes, all four paid a one-game price for a slap-on-the-wrist offense.

That said, their absence was the biggest Miami lost a season-opener against a Maryland squad that eventually went 1-6 in ACC play and the reason a bowl game is being forfeited is partially due to their actions and involvement with Shapiro. The program has to be bigger than the individual and sitting out the 2011 post-season is something everyone on board must accept willingly.

Months after the investigation was launched, underway and wrapped, the NCAA is yet to give Miami its official verdict. While the process is playing out, UM has chosen to go on offense, much like in did in 1995 when Pell Grant fraud resulted in probation and scholarship reductions.

Besides a self-imposed bowl ban after an 8-3 run, UM docked itself a handful of scholarships and in the end wound up losing 31 total between 1995 and 1999. As of now, though, Miami isn’t self-imposing any scholarship losses for the 2012 recruiting class, which could be taken as a good sign regarding the overall investigation and any feedback the NCAA might’ve sent back at this point.

A few weeks back NCAA president Mark Emmert stated that Miami was being “incredibly cooperative” and went out of his way to compliment UM president Donna Shalala for her role in the investigation – something unprecedented as the NCAA CEO wouldn’t normally chime in regarding such a high-profile case.

“The reality is that Miami, the university, has been incredibly cooperative,” Emmert said. “President Shalala is doing an incredible job of interacting with us. Donna is doing a great job. She is being very, very helpful.”

There are many in the UM camp who foolishly blame Shalala for everything that’s gone wrong with the football program over the years, convinced she could care less about what happens on the gridiron, which couldn’t be further from the truth. Shalala knows football is a revenue generator and that her student body wants UM to again be high-profile program. Having a middle-of-the-road team in no way is good for the University of Miami.

But besides what she’s done across the board for UM, in the end, Shalala will most likely be the reason Miami could get off lighter than many of the critics originally predicted.

Eight years in D.C. as Secretary of Health and Human Services under Bill Clinton prove one thing; Shalala is a politician who knows how to play the game and when you think of Washington politics and real scandal, the NCAA is a walk in the park and something she knows how to handle.

When you look at the two-year post-season ban and twenty-plus scholarships that Southern Cal lost in summer 2010, pay close attention to the “why”. Internal issues with the football as basketball programs are what brought the NCAA to town, but a big reason for the harsh punishment was due to USC not cooperating with the investigation.

Running back Reggie Bush is the name most familiar with the case, but it was his position coach Todd McNair who withheld information and lied during the process. That, coupled with the recruitment of one-and-done basketball star O.J. Mayo, showed a pattern and by stonewalling the NCAA instead of working towards resolution, the Trojans were penalized.

Former USC athletic director Mike Garrett was another problem. The former Heisman Trophy winner was a football-first type AD and the blame of “lack of institutional control” fell on his shoulders. There was always a sense of ego and entitlement that Garrett exuded and one can only assume that he brought that attitude to the NCAA investigation.

The Trojan program acted as if it was bigger than life the better part of the last decade – invincible and bulletproof. There was also no history of recent NCAA investigations – something the likes of Oklahoma, Ohio State, Miami and now Penn State, will benefit from. Southern Cal tried to play hardball and lost, which is why everyone else is learning to play nice, in effort to receive a lesser sentence and to not be made an example of.

When the NCAA does finally rule on Miami, many factors will play into the final decision. Aside from President Shalala doing an exemplary job of working with the NCAA, the self-imposed bowl ban will weigh heavily – and for “The U”, truly a no-brainer move sitting at 7-5 or 6-6.

Furthermore, the closest thing Miami had to a coach like McNair might’ve been a Clint Hurtt or Joe Pannunzio, both of which have been gone for over a year and neither of which covered up anything close to what McNair did for Bush — a rent-free home for his family in San Diego, airline tickets, money, a Vegas vacation and other gifts from an agent who was courting Bush.

At worse, Hurtt and Pannunizo knew that a few recruits were given a few bucks, were taken to a strip club and chowed down some Benihana on a visit.

And while former USC coach Pete Carroll stuck his head in the sand, claiming to have known nothing about Bush’s preferential treatment, former Miami head coach Randy Shannon knew of Shapiro and sternly warned players to stay away, while threatening assistant coaches with termination if they had anything to do with the rogue booster.

Yahoo! Sports dropped their bomb in August, complete with sensational headline and salacious details. In the end, it’s all about substance, though. What happened, what can be proven and who’s talking.

Beyond that, it’s about transparency and playing the game and Shalala is all about both. By being an open book and by taking it on the chin this post-season, Miami is setting itself up to be made an example of – in a good way.

In the end, expect President Emmert and the rest of the NCAA folk to use UM as the poster child for how a program in hot water should endure and properly handle the process.  – C.B.

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