WBB: Landmark Conference

[ronk]

Ronk:

Are you sure?

yes, as of 8:44 pm; there was a correction made today; maybe it was unavailable for the change when u checked. There's a pic of 10 of them(including all 5 frosh) on their twitter web site attending tonite's volleyball game.

[saratoga]

Still nothing on the womens basketball site regarding team picture & full roster bio.
All that's there is a picture of a few kids attending a volleyball game.
The mens 2016/17 team picture & roster has been up for about a week.

[ronk]

Still nothing on the womens basketball site regarding team picture & full roster bio.
All that's there is a picture of a few kids attending a volleyball game.
The mens 2016/17 team picture & roster has been up for about a week.

Literally, it was just the roster, no bio or team photo; the pic is of 10 of the 16 team members including the 5 frosh.

[gordonmann]

Preseason women's poll released. Scranton No. 5

http://d3hoops.com/top25/women/2016-17/preseason

[saratoga]

How is today's NCAA release about Thomas More & a certain player not the least bit surprising?
Their inaction in self reporting took the chance of another school celebrating a National Championship right off the table.
They should have been hit with a 4 year post season ban.

[Dave 'd-mac' McHugh]

How is today's NCAA release about Thomas More & a certain player not the least bit surprising?
Their inaction in self reporting took the chance of another school celebrating a National Championship right off the table.
They should have been hit with a 4 year post season ban.

First let's point out this is the first time Division III basketball has had a title vacated.

Second, a post-season ban seems pretty extreme, especially for four years, because an assistant coach who had been friends with Sydney Moss since she was my daughter's age tried to help her out post-op. This wasn't a "stay at my house because you can't afford the rent" situation. This was a "stay at my house because I am worried about your safety both because you are not able to move around easily and you live in a tough neighborhood" situation. The assistant coach thought like friend, not as a coach. Moss had been living on her own previously and after the fact.

The screw-up came when the head coach learned about the situation and instead of defering above him to his AD and compliance people and thought he knew the rules well enough to deem it okay. Furthermore, they screwed up because she stayed there probably longer than she should and truly became part of the family, babysitting, borrowing the car, etc. That's where the school and the assistant coach screwed up.

This isn't an effort to recruit Moss to the team and gain an advantage in having her stay - she was already staying and she had no plans to leave. This isn't an effort to help pay the rent or give her a break, she was already paying the rent and went back to paying the rent until this very day. As one former coach told me and I am paraphrasing quite a bit, this is when a coach tried to do best for a student for personal reasons and got screwed because the entire NCAA lives under the rules of Division I.

That said, yes there are rules and the school, head coach, and assistant coach screwed up. However, they were not trying to gain an advantage and I feel the assistant coach was clearly trying to look out for someone he knew very well and probably thought of as a daughter. That makes this situation sad.

To lose the entire season, to me, seems extreme. I have to keep researching the answer, but to declare Moss ineligible for the entire season when she may have only been eligible for the first semester seems extreme (I am not saying it is warranted, I just haven't read enough to make a determination). But at the same time, that is a HECK of a penalty. Lose the season and lose the schools first national championship. You want to tack on a four-year post-season ban? Hurt the next four years of student-athletes for a personal mistake? Seriously?

I will also contend, this is awfully harsh a penalty when compared to the Baruch case. There you had a college vice-president and a head coach PURPOSELY alter or forge in-state residence information to allow students to get discounts or even be allowed to attend the college in the first place with the sole idea that they needed to be a more competitive women's basketball team (and other sport). You had them both conspire to get these SAs jobs they were not qualified for or even had to apply for just to give them money so they would stay at the college. There are plenty of other infractions that were done on purpose. Not for the betterment of the student-athlete, but for the betterment of the program(s) and make them more competitive and even compete for national championships. They got a two-year (or one, forgetting) post-season ban, but they didn't have to vacate any games which means they keep their conference titles and NCAA tournament records. The records of those players are still intact because they were not, for some reason, ruled ineligible.

I had a problem with this Baruch case from the get-go where it seemed they got off light. Now the Thomas More case comes down and they are slammed for what by all appearances was a personal mistake based on trying to help a fellow human-being out... versus trying to circumvent the rules gain an advantage. TMC didn't gain an advantage. Moss was going to be on the team the next year no matter where she stayed as she recovered.

[saratoga]

Wouldn't it be convenient if all assistant coaches had star players living at their homes, providing services for the family & getting free room & board plus the use of the family pickup?
I believe Kean was hit with a 3 year post season ban when their head coach gave free A's to kids that didn't even have to show up for class.

[Dave 'd-mac' McHugh]

The Kean case was far more complicated than that. A class was created for the team and the team only that gave them free As (or at least high grades). The class was based on a foreign trip the team had taken. There was also grade changing taking place with other classes. The coach basically had the academic side of the school do whatever she wanted. Then when the AD self-reported it and moved it up the food-chain two or three times, he was "fired" (let go, didn't renew his contract), but the coach kept her job until about 11 games into the season that followed the investigation that was already underway.

Also, there was improper use of financial aid going to the team AND to other student-athletes at an unbelievably high rate.

Saratoga - I will also follow up that nothing the assistant coach did was to benefit the player in terms of money and food. She was already living on her own and she was already feeding herself. There was a prior relationship with her from her early playing days and he tried to help her post-op. Apparently the neighborhood she was living in isn't the greatest in terms of crime and being hobbled on one leg apparently was a concern of his. He suggested she move in to help her out. After eight months, she was back living on her own and does until this day. You can keep being sarcastic or mean-spirited, but this didn't benefit the team. Moss wasn't going anywhere. This didn't entice her to stay. The NCAA and Florida had forced her to look for a school not in Division I for the rest of her career. She chose TMC and wasn't going to be leaving. Her rehab and playing wasn't affected by him providing her a place to stay. She wasn't on campus in the first place and she apparently didn't ask to live with him because she couldn't afford it. She has no family in the area and he was trying to be her family. I am not in anyway obsolving TMC for their mistakes - they screwed this up big time, but the mean-spirited and attacks I have heard on TMC and Moss over the years and especially now are appalling. This division celebrates the student-athlete and those who choose to go to class (which she did), get good grades (which she did), be their own person (which she is), while also playing a sport (which she did). I am not sure why we look to now tear someone down for doing what ever other student-athlete does in this division. A mistake was made, but not for the reasons people want them to be... but for the reasons we try and help our fellow man. The school is paying the consequences because no one checked to make sure it was or was not okay... not because someone cared.

[saratoga]

Dave,

Let's clear a few things up.

* Not being sarcastic or mean spirited...simply stating that a coach & his entire staff made a dumb move by not self reporting the circumstances.
Each & every coach has to go through the handbook & test on various aspects.
How this infraction made it through the entire athletic dept. is hard to fathom.

*Mean spirited attacks on the school & player???
I've never said boo about that school or the player until the other day & what I said was it wasn't surprising given what some others with a closer view of the school have noted in previous years.

*As far as taking it out on kids that had nothing to do with the infractions...isn't that how the NCAA operates?
How many kids at Penn State had anything to do with Sandusky and his perversions?

Coaches are human & can screw up...what I've witnessed is that when the school realizes that & self reports with a corrective action plan, the sanctions are much less severe.

There was a breakdown somewhere at More & yes...this current crop of players will pay the price.

Just how the NCAA rolls.

[saratoga]

Not a bad weekend for the Lady Royals.
Their starters barely average 20 minutes in each game yet they defeat Kings & Wilkes by an average of 40 points.
Their inside/out game is a pleasure to watch.

[ronk]

 Lady Royals struggle @ Neumann 66-61; close the entire game with some lead changes. smaller, quicker  Neumann outrebounded the Royals but Bridgette Mann hit 12 straight FTs to win the game. Sarah with an uncharacteristic poor shooting game; she appeared to be about 3 feet beyond her normal shooting range. Alexix with a lane violation seconds into the 3rd quarter and was benched for rest of the quarter. Still a work in progress.

[saratoga]

They seemed to rush shot after shot as opposed to their normal passing the extra pass for a better shot approach.
These games will happen, can't win by 40 every night.
Some kids look a little sluggish, not sure if any are sick.
Defensively, Scranton was getting beat time and again off the dribble & they just didn't look comfortable out there.
Hope this game brought them back to earth a little.
Credit to Neumann (kids & coaching staff), they did just about everything they could to make the Lady Royals play their game.
The longer you let huge underdogs hang around, the more their confidence will grow & you'll end up in a game like this where the outcome is up for grabs.
I'll still take an ugly win over a pretty loss any day.

[augie]

Nice win for the Lady Royals against Neumann (tough game )and Juniata which never quit and I respect there heart.Things I took out of the last Two games Coach not happy with Payonk and Roman at Neumann sat out most of the 3rd period except a minute and Mann was under the weather a little bit but scored 25 and 19 tonight.There is some work to be done starting 2 freshman 1 sophomore 2 seniors.I noticed that there is another Freshman MacKenzie Mason who I think is a pretty good player and in my eyes should start until Julia Gantz gets back.She is 5'11 and plays great defense gets rebounds and she can score you can not keep sending someone out there that gives you 0 pts an a game if that is the case play 4 on 5 because that is what they are doing not getting production out of that 3rd spot it is hurting the Lady Royals.But they are 7-0 when that player comes back to fill that spot in January look out she had great statistics at Bloomsburg and also Rookie of the year in that league pretty good I would say.

[augie]

Nice Lady Royals moved up to 3rd got 1 vote for first place.I think that is what it means not sure but someone gave them a vote which is nice out of those top 4 teams there is only one team that beat a top ten teams or played a top ten team and that is Scranton the other teams like( dick vital )would say cupcake city baby.Not saying nothing bad about the voters but 7 games in not one team other then Scranton played and beat a top ten team.So keep that in mind like the cfs did with Ohio state in football.Just a thought for voters to take into consideration and it was on Rochester home floor you know that powerhouse conference.

[saratoga]

If, and this is a huge IF....

The Lady Royals run the table in the regular season as they did last year, if my math is correct, they will earn the programs 1,000 victory in their last game of the season vs. Goucher.


If they can pull that off, it would be a pretty neat way to enter the post season.