Brendan Smith

Today, the NCAA reported that they found no violations in the UNC academic fraud investigation. A three year investigation has provided no clear answer to what was seemingly a major fraudulent network of classes at the university. The committee formed to head the investigation was lead by SEC commissioner Greg Sankey, who released the following statement.

“While student-athletes likely benefited from the so-called ‘paper courses’ offered by North Carolina, the information available in the record did not establish that the courses were solely created, offered and maintained as an orchestrated effort to benefit student-athletes. The panel is troubled by the university’s shifting positions about whether academic fraud occurred on its campus and the credibility of the Cadwalader report, which it distanced itself from after initially supporting the findings. However, NCAA policy is clear. The NCAA defers to its member schools to determine whether academic fraud occurred and, ultimately, the panel is bound to making decisions within the rules set by the membership.”

So, essentially, the NCAA wasted large amounts of money on a three year investigation to be back right where they were when this whole thing happened. Since they cannot prove the allegations, the charges simply remain allegations. The NCAA could not look worse in this situation.

As mentioned on page one of the twenty-six page report released by the NCAA, there were two staff members at UNC that had knowledge of the fraudulent activity. Neither chose to cooperate during the investigation. After allegedly creating fake classes for 18 years, only two staff members had any knowledge of this occurring. Eighteen years and just two staff members knew about the fake classes. Somehow, this does not seem to add up.

The NCAA refuses to pay its players, but it will spend enough money and resources to conduct a three year investigation without any real results to show for it. This is now two instances in the past month making the NCAA look foolish. The other, of course, being the string of college basketball assistants committing fraud.

The fact that the NCAA could not get any type of charge on UNC is ludicrous. This may be attributed to the fact that, as Darren Rovell reported, UNC spent insane amounts on lawyers.

The NCAA report also states that the cooperation of the two staff members would have sealed the case against UNC. If that were the case, and the two were uncooperative, I’m sure Rashad McCants would love to help the investigation. McCants detailed his time at the school in a 2014 interview with the ESPN’s Outside the Lines. In the same article, it was reported that the academic fraud was first uncovered by the Raleigh News & Observer in 2011, three years before the NCAA began their investigation, and six years before they decided not to punish UNC.

McCants’ unofficial transcript that was obtained by Outside the Lines reported that he did not receive higher than a C in any class other than African-American Studies classes. The African-American Studies program was at the center of the school’s investigation, lasting from 2007-2011, according to the Washington Post. According to ESPN, 54 of those classes were found to be “aberrant” or “irregularly taught” according to ESPN.

In the same twenty-six page report, the main thing that the NCAA did was outline how to make fake classes, and not get punished for it. Nice one.