Texas Longhorns Reportedly Engaged in Academic Misconduct

By Daniel Tran | Jun 10, 2015

According to a report, the University of Texas participated in giving impermissible academic benefits to Texas Longhorns athletes, including members of the basketball team.

It appears like academic misconduct is becoming a focus for the NCAA this offseason. More and more it seems, reports of academic misbehavior are surfacing at major universities, forcing the NCAA to act out of fear of appearing to turn a blind eye. The most recent example of this is occurring in Austin, Texas.

According to a report by Brad Wolverton of the Chronicle of Higher Education, the University of Texas has allegedly allowed academic misconduct that benefits student-athletes to occur in their famed school. This comes on the heels of the University of North Carolina receiving their Notice of Allegations from the NCAA regarding their own case of impermissible academic benefits being handed out to their student-athletes.

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Specifically named in Wolverton’s report is former Texas basketball player Martez Walker, who played for the Longhorns during the 2013-14 season before leaving the team due to assault allegations. According to Wolverton, Walker was caught cheating during a test in a remedial math class by his instructor, Pamela Powell.

Walker was seen snapping pictures of the test and texting them to another student, who would text back the correct answer. Wolverton received confirmation of incident from two former academic advisors.

After witnessing the transgression, Powell contacted Adam Creasy, the liaison between the athletic department and Powell, who then directed her to contact executive senior associate athletic director for student services Randa Ryan. One would think that cheating at a top university would carry a minimum punishment of suspension and even expulsion. Neither of those would happen.

Instead, Walker passed the class and was named to the Big 12 Commissioner’s Honor Roll. Though there is no direct link indicating that the athletic department intervened to give Walker a pass, it does not take a detective to feel that there is something wrong with a student cheating and not receiving any punishment.

Two more players who participated on the basketball team were also subjects of the allegations against Texas. J’Covan Brown, a guard who played for the Longhorns from 2009-2012, is alleged to have part of a paper written for him, and P.J. Tucker may have had an assignment done for him while he was preparing for the NBA Draft.

All of these incidents occurred while Rick Barnes was the head coach of the Texas Longhorns basketball program. Barnes has stated he had no knowledge of the academic misconduct.

However, because there is a new NCAA policy where head coaches need to show an atmosphere of compliance, Barnes, who is now coaching at the University of Tennessee, could face NCAA sanctions if the allegations are found to be true.

With many of the players and administrators named in Wolverton’s article declining to comment, there may be a storm brewing that will hit Austin, Texas hard. The evidence may not be as hard as it was in the North Carolina case so far, but an investigation is surely on the horizon.

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