USC Ruling & Pac-10 Expansion
USC will be hit with a “Failure to Monitor” penalty. The fact that agents (rather than boosters) provided gifts and money is going to be the difference. My feeling is the NCAA had their decision back in February, but likely felt they didn’t have enough evidence to go with the harsher “Lack of institutional control” penalty, so they figured they’d make USC sweat and receive negative media attention as additional punishment.
The negative publicity hasn’t seemed to hurt recruiting this year. Though, I’d be surprised if there isn’t a wrist slap on scholarship numbers–expect a small reduction.
Are these penalties fair? No. I’m of the opinion that USC should get the SMU death sentence, but hey, I am harsh. Sanctions will probably wind up being a milder form of what happened in Alabama. An admonition if you will. Keep in mind that barring USC from post season play hurts the Beavers. Conference revenue is shared. So, again, we have to deal with the question of what is ethical or fair versus what is good for us as Beaver fans. It’s difficult.
My problem with USC is that when you look at the product on the field, it wreaks of shadiness, from the coaches they hire to the players they produce (e.g. was anyone surprised to see Brian Cushing test positive? Did anyone ever wonder why he and his fellow LBs were twice as big and jacked as the opponents’ linebackers?). When you look at them, something just looks wrong. This is not grass fed cattle we’re dealing with, boys. That’s the best way to put it. The NCAA has a golden opportunity to put an end to that and level the playing field. Think of the John Robinson (II) era, when USC was good but not a machine. That is normal. What we see now is abnormal. Something is amiss.
As far as PAC-10 expansion, I am growing a bit tired of it, but it looks like the chips will fall into place within the next week. I expect the PAC-16, and this is why: If Nebraska announces an intent to move to the Big-10, Missouri will then follow so as not to be left out. That signals the end of the Big-12. It also puts the Big-10 at 13 teams, which means they will pluck 2 teams from the Big East, likely Pitt and Syracuse, and force Notre Dame’s hand (note: the Big East is Notre Dame’s conference for every sport but football). Notre Dame wants to remain independent so as to manipulate their schedule and hoard revenue, so they will not be proactive and make a jump to the Big-10. If they did this, the Big-10 would be content and everything would remain status quo. However, they won’t, because they could always rejoin the league later as the 16th team. Therefore, despite what the Irish want you to believe, everything revolves around Nebraska, and since they loathe Texas’s influence over the Big-12, the Cornhuskers likely bolt for the Big-10. Expect the PAC-10 to vulture the tasty scraps.
While I dislike the likely scenario for competitive purposes (kiss goodbye realistic hope of a BCS bowl game), it would be nice to have an operating budget, facility upgrades, etc. Essentially what you wind up with is a de facto playoff system via the “super conference’s” championship game winner moving on to the title game. Could little Oregon State compete in such a scenario? I’ll leave that answer up to you guys.