"The Good Ol Boy Network" Did In North Carolina Basketball

There are a lot of layers to the institutional failures that are being lined out in the media when it pertains to the the academic scandal at the University of North Carolina.

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We can be upset as people on the outside looking in about many things, but when the anger is directed, it has to be pointed toward the people who are really running the show and are currently trying to control their narrative.

Those people being the administration a.k.a “The Good Ol’ Boy Network”.

Why would we want to point the finger at the “The Good Ol’ Boy Network” when it comes to North Carolina’s current state with the NCAA.

Because they are the ones that put a system in place at the institution so that they were able to put the best male and female athletes in their respective sports on the field or basketball court at the expense of the very thing that they as a college are in existence for — higher learning.

The administration has made it clear that their bottom line at the end of the day is making cold hard cash for themselves and the NCAA by, in essence, pimping their athletes for profits instead of truly educating these young men and women for life outside athletics.

The NCAA and these universities are able to divide up billions of dollars on the backs of men’s athletics, so the education side of the game takes a backseat when money is to be made.

(Photo: Richard Mackson, USA TODAY Sports)

That may sound like a slight exaggeration. But when you read the piece done on newsobserver.com by Dan Kane and Andrew Carter, and come to the realization that the mechanism for this academic fraud has been in place for at least the last 22 years, you come to the conclusion that the failure is deeply entrenched in the culture of UNC athletics.’

When you learn that a federal prosecutor by the name of Kenneth Wainstein discovered that “over an 18-year period more 3,100 students enrolled in fake classes and that half were athletes”, it speaks to how the institution was well aware of the system they had in place and that it has been around for a long time.

This issue is actually bigger than Roy Williams and Sylvia Hatchell on the basketball court.

This issue is about the lengths that a university will really go to in order to get the school dollars and be able to erect new buildings, facilities, stadiums, and arenas on campus, while being able to give themselves a raise every now and then.

According to the newsobserver.com piece:

"Wainstein found that the fraud began in 1993 when Deborah Crowder, then an administrative manager for the African studies department, started creating classes that had no instruction and only required a paper that she would then give a high grade. She was not a faculty member. She launched the fake classes after academic counselors for the athletes complained to her about independent studies that were too rigorous."

Then you come to find out that Deborah Crowder had a direct connection to a woman by the name of Burgess McSwain who was the men’s basketball academic counselor and such a huge fan of North Carolina basketball that “after losses he would miss work“.

But if this was during the alleged infancy of the system put in place over 20 years ago, and things are still coming to light about new improprieties during the schools own investigation, and players are coming forward years later about the “wink and a nod” way that the school was cooking the gradebooks like Rashad McCants did in October 2014 on ESPN’s “Outside The Lines”, it makes you wonder how long “The Good Ol’ Boy Network” knew about the issue and hid behind plausible deniability.

McCants even came out and said that Roy Williams was aware of the “paper class system” back in the 2004-05 season when UNC won the National Championship, and of course, right on cue, Roy Williams denied any knowledge in response to McCants statement by saying this via an ESPN.com article by Steve Delsohn:

"“With respect to the comments made today, I strongly disagree with what Rashad [McCants] . In no way did I know about or do anything close to what he says and I think the players whom I have coached over the years will agree with me. I have spent 63 years on this earth trying to do things the right way and the picture he portrays is not fair to the university or me.”"

This sounds like plausible deniability. Coach Williams sounds like someone who knows he has built up enough monetary equity with the NCAA and the university to where all he has to do is shrug and say not me, and no one will suspect him in the academic issues.

Who would you believe, a disgruntled ex-player who turned out to be an NBA draft bust, or one of the most decorated coach in college basketball that is connected to the network?

Which brings us to the issue at hand when it comes to how “The Good Ol’ Boy Network” has decided to handle this situation as it comes to a close.

(Photo: Jim Dedmon-USA TODAY Sports)

What fans are distraught about is how it appears that despite the fact it has been revealed that the “paper class system” was put in place in order to ensure that men’s basketball and football players were able to get on the field regardless of their individual failures in the classroom, the discovery of how women’s hoop is also a part of the scandal has become magnified to overshadow the men’s program.

That sounds like “The Good Ol’ Boy Network” at it’s finest. The network is going to insulate the cash cow’s (men’s basketball and football) from the amount of scrutiny it truly deserves, and spin the narrative in a way that offers up a sacrificial lamb to the masses, in this case the sacrificial lamb is Sylvia Hatchell and her hoop program.

You don’t think a paper shredder was in place to hide what the Roy Williams kids were doing or not doing in fake classes? Or what football players may or may not been involved in not listening to lectures.

Fortunately, North Carolina basketball fans, and casual observers of this episode are not stupid enough to think that she is a major part of the problem and should lose support from the UNC administration.

Yet former women’s players are of the opinion that the Women’s Basketball Program is being scapegoated in this situation. One in particular, Meghan Austin, even went as far as to say this in the newsobserver.com piece.

"“With the NCAA allegations, I am trying to wrap my head around how the women’s basketball team has been made the scapegoat in all of this. Our program was not the only team in the report, yet we are the ones being talked about the most.Roy Williams and his program were in the report, and he got a contract extension. The football program was in the report, and its coaching staff was confident enough to tell recruits that they will not receive any repercussions from the NCAA investigation.Some of us former players, we kind of sat down this summer and we were talking about how it didn’t sit right with us that it seems like there’s so many teams that were involved in the (bogus class) situation but women’s basketball was the one that people were pinpointing.There’s no support for Coach Hatchell at all, and a lot of us have worked in college athletics before, and we know how important it is to have the support of your bosses."

To be fair, there is a possibility that Sylvia Hatchell was aware of the improprieties also, and how some of her players benefited from the academic fraud system.

One of the NCAA allegations directly links an academic counselor to the women’s basketball team named Jan Boxill. They allege that she made it a point to keep women’s players eligible through academic fraud.

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But the facts are that Coach Hatchell barely benefited from the academic fraud system.

According to the article, when the lecture classes began, only 114 women’s students were ever enrolled in bogus African Studies lecture classes compared to 963 men’s football players and 226 men’s basketball players.

When it came to the independent studies courses that were established in 1993, the men’s basketball team was benefiting from that scam from the beginning while the women didn’t even start using them until 1998.

The men’s team had 57 independent studies enrollments compared to only 15 for the women.

As we all know, men’s athletics makes the money for most universities in the country.

So there is really no wonder as to why “The Good Ol’ Boy Network” would look to protect their men’s brands in this situation even going so far as to release some of their finding late enough to collect one more solid tournament payday before the NCAA concludes their findings and drops the hammer on them.

In the meantime, the narrative is starting to morph into how the women’s basketball program is the poster child of the North Carolina Academic Scandal, while the men’s programs rest comfortably in the protection that making money for “The Good Ol’ Boy Network” provides.

The “Good Ol’ Boy Network” does not provide the same shelter for women’s programs that don’t make money hand over fist like the fellas.

Quietly, “The Good Ol’ Boy Network” probably feels that Title IX is a bad law right along with the women’s right to vote and right to choose.

Sylvia Hatchell’s contract is up in 2018 while Roy Williams is extended until 2020. If we were honest about how we feel about how Sylvia Hatchell is getting railroaded, we would want her to finish out her contract, build on her outstanding 961-340 record (689-259 at UNC), and get away from the stress of dealing with “The Good Ol’ Boy” network.

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North Carolina Tar Heels

Then again, Mrs. Hatchell is a two-time cancer survivor, so “The Good Ol’ Boy Network ” is child’s play for a hero like her.

Still, fans would love for her to break free of the true ringleaders of the North Carolina Academic Scandal.

The ones that are protected by the shield of plausible deniability, but have enough information to bring forth new findings at a time that would guarantee that the men’s hoop team would get one more shot at getting an NCAA Title and making tournament revenue for the school and the NCAA.

The ones who throw their hands up and shrug with that “we don’t know what you are talking about look”, knowing that this thing has been going on for two decades.

The ones whose job is secure unless they have to sacrifice one of their own to save face and give off the PR appearance like they are on top of the situation.

We are talking about “The Good Ol’ Boy Network” whose sole job is to protect the money, especially their own.

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