Midweek meandering while wondering if Kansas University and North Carolina will meet in March during the NCAA men’s basketball tournament. …
Mark Mangino linked to the Notre Dame football vacancy? Are you kidding me?
Mangino has done a noteworthy job of resurrecting Kansas University’s once-moribund program, but he hardly has compiled the credentials that would enable Notre Dame athletic director Kevin White to sell him to the Irish faithful.
White’s surprise firing last week of Tyrone Willingham reminds me of Nebraska AD Steve Pederson’s dog and pony show of a year ago.
Out of the blue, Pederson dumped head coach Frank Solich, leading everyone to believe he had a candidate waiting in the wings. He didn’t. Then Arkansas’ Houston Nutt rejected the job, and Pederson settled for Bill Callahan, who had been fired by the NFL Oakland Raiders, and proceeded to lead the Cornhuskers to their first losing season since the days of one-platoon football.
On the surface, it appears Notre Dame’s AD dumped Willingham thinking he wouldn’t have any trouble hiring Urban Meyer away from Utah. But Meyer opted for Florida instead, leaving White with a fiddle and no strings.
Bottom line: In today’s cutthroat world of college football, Notre Dame is playing with a butter knife.
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Oops. Big 12 Conference schools will not be receiving as much money for having two Bowl Championship Series teams as I reported in Tuesday’s column.
The Big 12 will bank between $14.3 million and $17.6 million for having one team in the BCS, but the league will not receive twice that amount for both Oklahoma and Texas qualifying.
Instead, the Big 12 will collect an additional $4.5 million under this year’s BCS rules.
So the maximum the Big 12 can glean from its seven bowl teams is about $31 million. Subtract about a million in bowl expenses for each school and divide by 12 and the figure is $2 million per institution.
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Meanwhile, the BCS money withheld from the Big 12 through its current formula will go to lower echelon Div. I-A conferences as well as Div. I-AA leagues.
Little known fact: The BCS contributes $200,000 to the National Football Foundation and College Hall of Fame in South Bend, Ind. That shrine’s executive director is Bernie Kish, former director of football ticket sales at Kansas University.
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Today is the deadline for all NCAA Division One schools to submit recruiting policies that specifically prohibit inappropriate or illegal behavior. Most schools, like Kansas University, submitted their policies long ago.
“You had to have one before recruits came to campus,” KU senior associate athletic director Kelly Mehrtens said.
In August, NCAA President Myles Brand — burning over stories out of Colorado University about booze, strippers and sex — ordered those activities banned along with gambling and use of illegal drugs.
In addition, schools must use standard vehicles, lodging, meals and coach-class airfare. Also on the no-no list are such personalized recruiting inducements as jerseys, scoreboard presentations or simulated game-day experiences.
“The only rule that will change things for us,” Mangino said last August, “is hanging a jersey with the recruit’s name on it in the locker room and using the video board.”
Bonnie Henrickson, KU’s new women’s basketball coach, spoke for her contemporaries when she said: “I really do believe there is an entitlement issue in recruiting. I think young men and young women need to know about accountability. I think this is a step in the right direction.”
