It got worse at SEC spring meetings in May 2019. Wade fumbled his way through a laughable press conference, refusing to answer hard questions, looking and sounding like a teenager trying to explain to his parents why he broke curfew. LSU stood idly by, watching its coach make a fool of himself.
Then, as NCAA infractions cases tend to do, the affair went underground for a long period of time. LSU fans, and fanboy media, so desperate to believe nothing would happen, declared it a dead issue. LSU administrators seemed to hope the thing would dry up and blow away as well.
But, behind the scenes, the work went on. The NCAA Enforcement staff, and later the Complex Case Unit of the Independent Accountability Review Process, methodically built its case.
And boy howdy, did they deliver an NOA. Eleven alleged violations, eight of them Level I (the most severe), with the Lack of Institutional Control charge as the cherry on top. The CCU threw both at LSU, and Wade in particular.
In addition to the “strong-ass offer” allegation, there is one alleging Wade paid hush money to the former fiancé of a former player in 2017. LSU apologists who tried to explain away the wiretap are going to really be taxed when it comes to dismissing this one.
Another allegation: In 2020, well after Wade was under the microscope for the wiretap, he and assistant coach Bill Armstrong provided an array of impermissible benefits. The NOA specifically states Armstrong “offered to provide [name redacted] and/or his family members or associates with $300,000 cash. …” A source with ties to the LSU program told Sports Illustrated years ago that Wade and his staff were making six-figure offers to multiple recruits and named two of them who became standout players for the Tigers.
There was also an allegation Wade obstructed (and elongated) the NCAA investigation by refusing to supply records. (The texts with the former fiancé show exactly why Wade didn’t want to cooperate.) Although there are no details attached, a look at the case’s timeline makes clear that disputes over documents and other legal wrangling inhibited a more timely resolution. And while Wade was obstructing, LSU was still sending him fat paychecks.
The football allegations in the NOA are not small potatoes, either. The biggest is a $180,000 payment from a booster to the father of a player for a no-show job, but if you want a window into how LSU has operated, the fallout from Odell Beckham Jr.’s doling out of cash in the immediate aftermath of winning the College Football Playoff in January 2020 provides a beauty. The violation itself is not terribly scandalous. But when the school’s response to the media was that Beckham was handing out fake money, it showed that its first institutional instinct was to brazenly lie. It was only later, when quarterback Joe Burrow acknowledged during a national media appearance that the money was real, that LSU backtracked.
No wonder the con-man basketball coach felt right at home there.
LSU said in a statement Saturday it does not agree with all the charges and likely will contest some of them (though it has already conceded the football charges). This might not all stick to the Tigers through a hearing and subsequent ruling, which will come somewhere down the line in 2022.
Still, it would take a miracle—or some staggering incompetence on the part of either the CCU or the IARP hearing panel—for this not to result in major sanctions. Will Wade will never coach college basketball again, and the profession will be better because of it. And the school will pay a price for resolutely refusing accountability.
But none of that helps those who were freshly fired or who are sitting in prison. Will Wade kept getting paid while they paid a price.
Source link
