Ohio State still under scrutiny

OSU Still Under Investigation

 
INDIANAPOLIS — As Ohio State heads into its Friday meeting with the NCAA Committee on Infractions, it appears the university’s dealings with the NCAA over problems within its football program will not end there.

The NCAA notified Ohio State by letter last week that it is still investigating other issues involving the program.

The result could be a second notice of allegations and a second trip through the NCAA justice system.

OSU spokesman Jim Lynch said president Gordon Gee got a letter from the NCAA on Aug. 3 but that it said “absolutely nothing about additional allegations.”

“The university has not received any additional allegations from the NCAA.” Lynch said. “As a member institution, we are committed to working together with the NCAA to examine any information concerning potential violations of NCAA legislation. We do not anticipate discussing any additional allegations with the Committee on Infractions on Friday other than those self reported in March, 2011.”

In its July 21 official case summary, the NCAA enforcement staff notified Ohio State that it was not charging the school with the serious “failure to monitor” charge at its hearing Friday as a result of violations related to memorabilia sold to a local tattoo parlor owner. The staff concluded that the charge, which can bring heavy penalties, was “unwarranted” due to the athletic department’s efforts in educating players and coaches about NCAA rules about extra benefits. However, NCAA protocol does allow for the Committee on Infractions to add penalties if it sees fit. The July 21 case summary also addressed only the allegations related to the tattoo parlor — no statement was made in the NCAA’s 17-page report about the status of any the other allegations that have come forth since scandal erupted.

There have been multiple media reports that came out after the school received its notice of allegations April 25. That notice alleged that then-Buckeyes coach Jim Tressel committed ethical misconduct, among other charges.

Among the reports since then: an ESPN “Outside The Lines” story alleging that former Ohio State quarterback Terrelle Pryor was paid thousands of dollars in exchange for signed gear by local memorabilia collector, photographer and Buckeyes fan Dennis Talbott; an “OTL” report about Pryor and other Buckeyes playing free rounds of golf with Talbott at a Columbus-area country club; and a Columbus Dispatch report that scrutinized dozens of automobile sales to Ohio State athletes and family members from a pair of Columbus-area dealerships.

In the wake of those media reports, there was speculation that the Committee on Infractions might postpone Ohio State’s scheduled hearing. That did not happen, but it does not signal an end to the process.

When Ohio State spokesman Jim Lynch was questioned last week specifically about Talbott by ESPN’s Tom Farrey, his response indicated that the investigation of the football program is ongoing.

“… We will not be able to discuss details of our active investigation with the NCAA until the matter has been resolved,” Lynch wrote in an email to Farrey.

Also Wednesday, Ohio State athletic director Gene Smith told The Associated Press in an email that the NCAA investigation has cost the school’s athletic department about $800,000. The AP reported that Smith declined to discuss the investigation other than to confirm the cost, which he said was about $800,000 “at this point.”

Pat Forde is a senior writer for ESPN.com. Information from ESPN’s Tom Farrey and The Associated Press is included in this report.

Follow Pat Forde on Twitter: @espn4d

Is Gordon Gee serious?

The Ohio State president recently told a joke that revealed the hidden truth about college sports. He’s been playing defense ever since.

Gee’s grand office befits his status as the nation’s top-paid public university president.

ABOUT 40 MINUTES BEFORE I MET GORDON GEE, I decided to play a joke on him. I entered a Columbus bookstore and bought a bow tie. They’re popular on campus because Gee, Ohio State’s president, famously wears one every day. I was visiting at a touchy time, in the middle of an NCAA investigation, to discuss a sensitive subject: a joke of Gee’s that bombed. I had to see whether he could take a joke. So I dropped $26, stood before a men’s room mirror and fastened the scarlet tie under the collar of my blue-and-white-checkered shirt. When I entered Gee’s second-floor office overlooking The Oval, the heart of campus, his assistant’s eyes jumped. “Did you wear that for him?” she asked. “Nobody’s ever done that.”

The funniest jokes are grounded in truth. But not all truthful jokes are funny — as Gee learned on March 8, when he deadpanned a most revealing zinger about the state of college sports. It occurred at a news conference to announce then-football coach Jim Tressel’s punishment for knowingly using ineligible players during the 2010 season, then covering it up. Gee had hoped to show a skeptical public that he was in firm control of his athletic department, but the event quickly turned into, in Gee’s words, “a disaster.”

Instead of quickly apologizing, Tressel portrayed himself as a victim whose love for his players overshadowed the “NCAA part of things.” Meanwhile athletic director Gene Smith struggled to sell Tressel’s punishment of a two-game suspension and $250,000 fine. When Gee approached the podium, a bad performance got even worse.

Wearing a scarlet-and-gray-striped bow tie, Gee, typically a flamboyant speaker, flatly praised Tressel’s “superb integrity.” As Gee backed away from the mic, a reporter started to ask whether dismissing Tressel had ever crossed his mind.

“No — are you kidding?” Gee interrupted. He sputtered for a second, searching for a one-liner to break the tension. “Let me be very clear,” he said. “I’m just hoping the coach doesn’t dismiss me.”
Smith, standing behind Gee, grinned briefly before zipping it, as if caught snickering in class. But nobody else laughed. The joke landed with a silent thud. In the ensuing weeks, as the scandal escalated, the national media recycled the line in blogs and in print, on TV and radio. That offhand remark, a glib aside, would ultimately become the news conference’s most famous quote, drawing a host of admonishments from college sports executives.

What were you thinking? was one AD’s reaction. Florida president Bernie Machen says he shook his head and thought, I bet you wish you had it back. Five months later, Tressel is gone and Gee is preparing to testify before the NCAA Committee on Infractions. His fellow presidents wonder whether the man who once promised zero-tolerance for Buckeye rule breakers might lose his job in the scandal’s wake.

Along the way, Gee had aired his profession’s worst-kept dirty little secret: that presidents can’t really control athletics. Although every infractions case reveals as much, nobody had ever simply admitted it.
Critics can complain all they want about how athletics encroach on a university’s true mission, but as state revenues shrink, the inconvenient truth is that sports increasingly bankroll academics. Of the 120 FBS colleges, a mere 22 had profitable athletic departments in 2010. But in a 2009 Knight Commission survey of 95 FBS presidents, 51 percent said that sports help generate revenue for their universities.
Call them a loss leader. Last year, for instance, Texas president Bill Powers, in trying to persuade defensive coordinator Will Muschamp to stay, sought permission from UT’s trustees to double Muschamp’s salary to $1 million. The request was granted because athletics had just contributed $30 million to the university. “Yes, the salaries are robust,” Powers says. “But it pays off.”

Kevin Fitzsimons/The Ohio State UniversityGee, the consummate cheerleader, works the crowd in September 2010, three months before the “tats for trophies” scandal broke.To raise money, presidents seduce donors with sideline credentials, locker room visits and private calls with the coach — anything to make a check writer feel like an insider. On football Saturdays, presidents mingle and conduct business in their suites with billionaires and politicians. If athletics are run well, the university is too. Or so goes the perception. And if a winning team makes a donor more likely to cut a check for a new library, then firing a coach can be that much tougher. Robert Gates, who has been both secretary of defense and a university president, once said that it was easier to remove a dictator than it was to oust the football coach at Texas A&M.

Few understand that better than 67-year-old E. Gordon Gee, who’s been a university president for 31 years, longer than any other American. Gee’s job is complicated and fascinating: One minute he’s speaking with Ohio governor John Kasich, the next he’s appeasing angry faculty, the next he’s welcoming freshmen. But two cards on Gee’s office table, he says, “remind me what my business is on a day-to-day basis.” Scribbled on one card: But for Gordon Gee, The Ohio State University would not have received its first $100,000,000 gift — largest in school history.

The other reads:Gordon,Think about it … BEAT Michigan(Not mimic Michigan)

Both are from Leslie Wexner, the billionaire chairman of OSU’s board of trustees. One of Gee’s 18 bosses.
TURNS OUT, Gee can take a joke. He laughs when he sees my tie. “You wore that for me?” he says. “I knew I was going to love you.”

He extends his arms to my shoulders in a near hug, as if we’re slow dancing in junior high. Then he tilts his head disapprovingly: “A clip-on?” (Gee would later confide to me that he wears his ties slightly messy so that nobody will think they’re clip-ons.) He asks his secretary to get me a real bow tie, a professional charmer at work.

Skinny and slightly hunched, with grayish-blond hair neatly parted to the right, blue eyes squinting behind black bottle glasses, trousers fastened by suspenders, and a white shirt and blue coat topped by that ubiquitous bow tie, Gee looks every inch the geeky academic. But beneath the tie beats the heart of a hardened executive. A native of Vernal, Utah, he received his doctorate in education from Columbia, and after stints as a law professor at Brigham Young and as dean of West Virginia’s law school, he was hired as West Virginia’s president in 1981, at age 37. From there, Gee moved to Colorado, Ohio State, Brown and Vanderbilt before returning to Columbus in 2007. He now presides over 64,077 students, 42,370 employees and a $5 billion budget.

Make no mistake: To have survived this long in his chosen profession, Gee has had to be a ruthless, political, ball-crushing, consensus-building cheerleader. Faculty members marvel at how he rarely forgets a name — and how quickly he recovers when he does.

During summers, he travels the state in a van to persuade students to attend OSU instead of Cornell. In the fall, he hits frat parties and drops into dorms carrying pizzas. On this mid-June week, he’s met with House Speaker John Boehner, fired off a few tweets to his 19,000-plus followers, placated angry faculty and met with his athletics staff about the NCAA investigation.

Yet as he sits with legs crossed in a leather chair in his apartment-size office, Gee seems calm. “Internally, this hasn’t been a difficult issue,” he says, noting that academic politics are often far bloodier. Still, the violations are damning because he, unlike most presidents, aligns himself with sports so publicly. Yes, many presidents serve as deal closers for recruits, and most stuff their offices with footballs from big wins. But only Gee appears on JumboTrons to rally the crowd, has a chunk of a goalpost from Colorado’s 1990 title-clinching Orange Bowl game on his desk and begins each morning with Mike and Mike.

Last year, he drew so much heat for his “Little Sisters of the Poor” comment, disparaging the schedules of Boise State and TCU, that he ended up apologizing to the sisters before the Ohio Legislature. (He is now, he says with a laugh, their “biggest fundraiser.”) A few years ago, when star linebacker James Laurinaitis deferred NFL millions to return for his senior year, Gee called him and said, “James, I’m going to take you to dinner.” The meal turned out to be an NCAA violation — one of many minor ones Gee commits each year. “I’m more self-reported than any president in the country,” he quips.

Again, others might not laugh. At Miami, president Donna Shalala personally hires each coach. She studies the NCAA rulebook and weekly compliance reports. During football games, she scours the sidelines for suspicious guests. “I’m on alert all the time,” she says.

Many presidents complain that they have to spend too much time on sports, relative to their percentage of university budgets. Even Ohio State’s football revenue — $51.8 million last season — accounts for just 1 percent of the school’s total budget. But presidents have no one to blame but themselves. During the 1980s, in the wake of SMU’s Death Penalty, Gee headed a group of presidents dedicated to reining in athletics; that effort led to the concept of institutional control. In the ’90s, presidents created the D1 Board of Directors to decide policy on matters ranging from eligibility standards to expanding the schedule. Then in 2002, presidents tapped one of their own, Indiana’s Myles Brand, to head the NCAA. The message was clear: Presidents — not players, fans or even Congress — run college sports. Which is why today, if you’re dreaming of a football playoff or thinking that athletes should be paid, only presidents can make it happen.

It’s ironic, then, that presidents have so little power in managing their own houses. And that if those houses blow up, presidents can go down in flames along with coaches and ADs. It happened recently to USC’s Steven Sample, who resigned during the Reggie Bush case. Gee says that at NCAA meetings, presidents “sing ‘Kumbaya’ ” about clamping down on athletics but that back on campus, they wilt under “tremendous pressure from their boards” to produce winning teams. As Nebraska chancellor Harvey Perlman puts it, “We’re responsible, but we’re not any more in control.”

All they can do is joke about it.

“I survive on humor,” Gee says. His shtick is to be self-deprecating. Still, he now sees that his Tressel joke was, let’s just say, a clunker. “The coach was supposed to say I’m sorry. Instead, he had gone into a long conversation, which I didn’t think was very healthy. So my tongue spoke before my brain, and the minute I said it, I thought, What a stupid thing.”

The truth is that Gee, like a politician who recycles a good line, had used versions of that bit for years. He once joked that he became Vanderbilt’s president so that his salary could actually exceed the football coach’s. (He now makes $1.8 million, the most among presidents of American public universities.) And he’s tickled Buckeyes audiences by explaining that he knows his place: “With [former football coach] John Cooper, I’d call him and he’d answer. With Tressel, he calls me and I answer.”

Throughout his career, Gee’s charm has helped him gloss over his inability to lasso athletics and has allowed him to mitigate his own controversial comments. He’s always tried to control athletics by amassing political capital, spending it on sports and living with the glory or fallout. It’s roulette, really. One of his first acts after being hired by Colorado in 1985 was to extend the contract of football coach Bill McCartney, who had won just seven games in three years. Gee invested capital in his coach, and five years later the Buffaloes split the national title. Gee’s epiphany: “Always stick with a coach you believe in.”

His first stab at Ohio State, he says, was tougher, both with academics and athletics. Faculty and local government roasted him after he eliminated the university’s open-admissions process. He now admits he was overwhelmed by the intensity of the only big-time show in a football-mad state. The athletics department, more than at any other college, was “separate and isolated.” It was on him to reach out. But since he didn’t look like a sports fan, he says, he felt he had to pander — and it was so awkward he thought he might be fired. “I had to gain a level of credibility,” he says. “If not, I’d have serious problems.” So he turned himself into a lifeline for coaches, according to Cooper: “Most presidents say, ‘Okay, get it done.’ He said, ‘Okay, how can I help you get it done?’”

When Gee returned to Ohio State in 2007 — trustees wanted him back after the controversial moves of his first term, including the stricter admission standards, paid off — athletics were more powerful than ever. Tressel was a legend after winning the 2002 national championship. Gee, seeing opportunity, aligned himself with the coach, using Tressel’s celebrity to improve the campus. Tressel co-chaired and donated an undisclosed amount to a $109 million library renovation; Smith chipped in $9 million from athletics. The Buckeyes won the Big Ten four years in a row and earned millions from postseason bowls. Gee, meanwhile, met his annual fundraising targets, often as high as $350 million.

In all, working with athletics was “easier than I thought,” Gee says. Perhaps that’s because he didn’t meet monthly with the compliance office, normal procedure on other campuses, or because he softened his zero tolerance policy for rule breakers. He tried to create more oversight — and protect himself — by creating layers. He appointed a liaison to athletics so that, as he says, “It’s not just the AD and the president responsible.” Because of the changes, compliance staffers didn’t feel they had the power to ask tough follow-up questions. And Tressel, who declined comment for this article, wasn’t exactly forthcoming.

When the whole thing blew up this spring, Gee was still left holding the bag. “How would I know that players would sell memorabilia to a tattoo parlor?” he says. “No matter what procedures are in place, people can get around them.” Yet he also admits he sent the signal that he didn’t want to be bothered. “None of us want to hear bad news,” he says. “We hear what we want to hear. It’s not just about people being forthcoming. It’s about us being receptive, and I start with myself.”

Gee says that many OSU officials, including provost Joseph Alutto, advised him to fire Tressel. But that’s not how presidents survive. Gee subscribes to a three-bullet theory: He believes he gets only three mea culpas with the trustees before he’s, as he puts it, “pumping gas.” He didn’t want to burn political capital by unilaterally firing Tressel, who had friends on the board. “It would not have been pretty,” Gee says.
The president had a choice: back his coach and take heat or fire him and risk hell. “There were a lot of negative scenarios,” he says. “And no right answer.” As one of Gee’s fellow university presidents says: “You have to work through issues like this in ways that don’t make the ‘losers’ angry. It comes down to how you handle relationships, and Gordon is very politically savvy.”

So as Gee publicly defended Tressel, he also privately appointed an internal task force to assess the damage. Throughout the scandal, he kept OSU’s board abreast of every detail. “I still have my job, so you still have yours,” he’d joke to his secretaries after each meeting. And once it appeared that the violations were more widespread than Tressel had admitted, the trustees universally supported the decision to force the coach to resign. “There was no daylight in the decision,” Gee says.

The result was an NCAA charge that indicted only the players and Tressel, sparing OSU the dreaded “failure to monitor” tag, which would have carried stiffer penalties. “That was critical,” Gee says of the charge. “It shows what it was: a coach who failed to disclose, and players who sold memorabilia.” Due to the embarrassment the scandal brought the university, Gee admits he “might have gotten close” to firing one of his three bullets and removing Tressel earlier. (Tressel’s resignation was later recast as a retirement, sparing the coach a $250,000 fine. As for his relationship with Tressel, Gee says the two men, once chummy, haven’t spoken since.)
Heading into the infraction hearing phase, Gee is not out of the woods yet. Just as the trustees turned on Tressel, they could still flip on the president. That’s the risk of governing big-time athletics. But everyone knows that boosters, trustees, students and faculty will forgive NCAA infractions in exchange for the benefits reaped from football Saturdays.

Maybe that’s why, according to OSU chemistry professor Rob Coleman, “nobody bad-mouths Gee” at faculty meetings. On a June day, Coleman drives the point home. He walks up to the third floor of Evans Lab, a chemistry building that he says used to resemble “an open sewer.” It was so bad that faculty hid it from prospective students. After Gee saw it, he immediately started a seven-figure renovation. This summer, construction began on a new building. Faculty might wish that Gee had kept his lame joke to himself, but nobody wants him gone. After all, he’s as good at his job as Tressel was at his.

ON A JUNE AFTERNOON, Gee enters a town-hall-style meeting with the staff advisory counsel. He hugs professors, calls everyone by name and mocks himself after announcing a staff promotion that had already been made public. Pure Gee. Then he opens the floor to questions.
Nobody asks about athletics. Nobody brings up the joke. Nobody prods him about the NCAA investigation hanging over his head.

Finally, one person touches on the scandal, in a sideways manner: The questioner wants to know how the university can receive publicity for its positive work, not just its football problems. She is essentially asking Gee to fix Ohio State’s image without fixing its problem — maybe because she, like Gee, knows that the problem is bigger than any of them.

Already done, Gee assures her: Neither fundraising nor enrollment has been affected. “This isn’t my first rodeo,” he says.

That’s no joke.

Seth Wickersham is a senior writer for ESPN The Magazine.

Associated Press

COLUMBUS, Ohio — Former Ohio State coach Jim Tressel was told by the school that he did a poor job of self-reporting NCAA violations years before he failed to tell his bosses that players were selling championship rings and other Buckeyes memorabilia, a cover-up that cost him his job.
In an evaluation of Tressel’s job performance from 2005-06, then-athletic director Andy Geiger rated Tressel “unacceptable” in terms of self-reporting rules violations in a timely manner. The coach was also warned in a separate letter that he and his staff needed to do a better job of monitoring the cars the players were driving — an issue that would arise again this spring.

Tressel received a letter of reprimand from Geiger for giving a recruit a Buckeyes jersey — a clear NCAA violation — before he had even coached his first game. Geiger put the letter in Tressel’s personnel file on June 15, 2001 — he was hired earlier that year on Jan. 17.
In spite of a sparkling 106-22 record and winning the 2002 national championship, Tressel was forced to step down May 30 after it became clear that he had knowingly played ineligible players during the 2010 season.
Investigators discovered he found out in April 2010 that players were receiving cash and discounted tattoos from the owner of a local tattoo parlor in exchange for Buckeyes football memorabilia, but he did not report that to his superiors or NCAA compliance officers — and didn’t even acknowledge he had known of the problem until confronted in January.
Ohio State — which has vacated the 2010 season, including its share of the Big Ten championship, and has issued itself a two-year probation — is now facing an Aug. 12 meeting before the NCAA’s Committee on Infractions.
In his 2005-06 evaluation, Tressel was graded “excellent” in 10 of 12 areas. Yet the NCAA-Ohio State evaluation form also rated Tressel “unacceptable” in self-reporting violations and in “timely and accurate completion of phone and unofficial visit logs.”
Ohio State says that current AD Gene Smith met with Tressel for oral evaluations of his performance and that no written records exist.
In Ohio State’s response to the NCAA’s allegations against Tressel and the program last week, Tressel said, “I take full responsibility for my mistakes that have led to the ongoing NCAA inquiry and to scrutiny and criticism of the football program.”
“I am writing to make it clear that the University expects you and your staff to pay attention to automobiles driven by the football student-athletes and report to the Athletic Compliance Office any unusual circumstances with respect to such automobiles.”– Then-AD Andy Geiger, to Jim Tressel in 2003 letterThis spring, the NCAA also investigated the cars driven by Ohio State players. That subject was broached in a letter by Geiger dated Sept. 9, 2003, that cautioned Tressel he and his staff needed to do a better job of monitoring the players’ cars.
“In the course of the investigation, there were questions surrounding, among others, (redacted name’s) automobiles and cell phone use,” Geiger wrote to Tressel. “I am writing to make it clear that the university expects you and your staff to pay attention to automobiles driven by the football student-athletes and report to the Athletic Compliance Office any unusual circumstances with respect to such automobiles.”
In the past year, the NCAA and Ohio State investigated the cars owned by and loaned to star quarterback Terrelle Pryor.
Ohio’s Bureau of Motor Vehicles looked into 25 sales involving Buckeyes players and determined that the dealers received fair-market value for the cars. The bureau did not address whether the deals met NCAA standards prohibiting benefits not available to the general student population.
Pryor announced shortly after Tressel was forced out that he would forgo his final year of eligibility and make himself available for an NFL supplemental draft.
The heavily redacted material released Friday by Ohio State also included:
•  Reprimands in Tressel’s file for permitting an outside person to coach kickers before a full team practice and allowing the mother of a recruit on an official visit to make a call for $7.93 that was billed to the university. In addition, his file contained at least two “letters of caution and education” charging that Tressel gave complimentary tickets to a home game to a recruit’s parents and allowed an unidentified student-athlete to “practice with the team during fall camp for 19 days despite (his) not having completed his NCAA Drug Testing Consent Form.”
In his letter, Geiger wrote to Tressel: “It is our goal to avoid all violations. … It is your responsibility to adhere to the NCAA rules and make sure you and your coaching staff understand the importance of strict compliance with all NCAA rules.”
•  A police report detailing the investigation into the theft of at least 10 pairs of Ohio State football cleats from the team’s locker room inside Ohio Stadium last November. Ohio State police interviewed the three players who said they had cleats stolen — Pryor, wide receiver DeVier Posey and leading rusher Dan Herron. A campus police officer later posed as a buyer on eBay and bought a pair of cleats signed by Pryor. But a team equipment manager said that pair was an older model and was not one of those stolen. No charges were filed in the case.
•  That men’s basketball coach Thad Matta had five cautionary letters put in his personnel file during the early part of his seven-year tenure but was later praised for his relationship with the school’s NCAA compliance department.
Tressel’s attorney has said that the ex-coach intends to join Ohio State officials, including Smith and interim head coach Luke Fickell, for the August meeting before the Committee on Infractions. The school and Tressel recently agreed not to sue each other, and Tressel has been able to formally change his departure from a resignation to a retirement from Ohio State.
Ohio State has suspended six players (five after Pryor’s departure, including both Posey and Herron) for the first five games of the 2011 season and has vacated its 12 wins from last season, including its victory over Arkansas in the Allstate Sugar Bowl. In addition, it also self-imposed a two-year NCAA probation. The NCAA can choose to accept those penalties or add to them.

Copyright 2011 by The Associated Press

Ivan Maisel

Mike Vrabel - Ohio State Cheats

1. Ohio State did what it felt it must in its response to the NCAA. It laid the blame for its NCAA violations at the feet of departed coach Jim Tressel. Here’s why that rings hollow. For 10 years, the university basked in the aura of Tressel’s success as a coach and leader of young men. Shouldn’t Ohio State accept the responsibility — and the penalty — for Tressel’s actions as easily as it wrapped itself in his success?

2. Mike Vrabel’s decision to retire after 14 years in the NFL and join the staff of his former Ohio State roommate, Luke Fickell, is a great pick-me-up for Buckeye fans. The question is whether Vrabel will enjoy the 80-hour weeks, the recruiting, and all the things besides X’s and O’s that college assistants must do. When Bill Walsh returned to Stanford as head coach in 1992, he hired four of his former 49er players as assistants. None lasted long as college coaches (although one, Tom Holmoe, now is BYU athletic director).

My friends,

In 2010, I made a bet with a friend B*, regarding me being an Ohio State fan. The terms of the agreement were: 1.) The bet pertained only to the 2010 Ohio State vs. Iowa NCAA Div I Varsity Football game. 2.) If Ohio State Wins, B* is no longer allowed to question me being a fan nor slander Ohio State in my presence. 3.) If Iowa wins, J* must become an Iowa Hawkeye fan for the remainder of his life.

The Official score of said game from November 20, 2010 – Ohio State 20, Iowa 17. Resulting in a Win for Ohio State and a Win for J* per the terms of the betting agreement.

As of July 7, 2011, The Ohio State University Athletic Department issued the following self-imposed punitive actions to the NCAA Rule Committee:

2. Punitive Actions – (Pages 4-1 and 4-2 of Information Question #4 in this response detail the punitive actions taken by the institution). Below is a summary:

I-9

a. Vacate all victories during the 2010 football season, including the 2011 Allstate Sugar Bowl;

b. Vacate the 2010 Big Ten Conference Football Championship (co-champions);

Therefor, it is my responsibility as a fair sport and friend to B*, to acknowledge that because of this forfeiture of the 2010 wins, I have officially lost this bet and effective July 7, 2010, I, J* after 13+ years as an Ohio State fan, do so relinquish my right as said Ohio State fan and in accordance to the rules of our betting agreement, do swear by the Black and Gold and the University of Iowa Hawkeyes, to be my team of allegiance for the remainder of my life as a loyal Hawkeye fan.

Sincerely,

J*

Associated Press

COLUMBUS, Ohio — With the hours dwindling until the deadline for Ohio State’s response to NCAA allegations of improper benefits and a cover-up in the football program, athletic director Gene Smith said Thursday that he’s disappointed by “where we are” even as he’s encouraged by the work of the school’s compliance department.

Ohio State is on track to submit its reply by Friday to NCAA charges of major violations that led to coach Jim Tressel’s forced resignation and the departure of star quarterback Terrelle Pryor.

“I feel good about how we collaborated with the NCAA and about what you’ll see in our response,” Smith told The Associated Press. “But I am disappointed where we are” in terms of violations and possible sanctions.

Smith declined to address particulars about Ohio State’s answer to the NCAA’s 14-page cover letter and list of allegations, which were sent to the university in April. He said Ohio State had worked hard to answer all the questions stemming from charges that football players received cash and discounted tattoos from a local businessman and that Tressel had covered up his knowledge of the NCAA violations.

Despite Ohio State fans and others blaming the school’s compliance officials for the problems, Smith said his respect for the beleaguered department actually increased.

“I’ve learned so much throughout this process,” he said. “I feel somewhat reaffirmed that the compliance department does a good job. Are there things we could be better at? No question.”

Smith added that he and many Buckeyes athletes feel betrayed by those who broke NCAA rules.

“It’s been hard. This has hurt our fans. We’ve been damaged,” he said. “We’ve really been hurt by the fact that everybody in the athletic department has been indicted because of the actions of a few.”

In a congratulatory letter recently sent to all Ohio State athletic administrators, coaches and staff, Smith attempted to raise the morale of a department that has been battered by the scandal. The letter highlighted that the university had a record 523 scholar-athletes; there were 329 academic All-Big Ten honorees; the football team’s 985 on the NCAA’s Academic Progress Report was No. 1 of the teams in the final Top 25; and Ohio State won national championships in men’s volleyball and synchronized swimming in addition to 10 Big Ten titles.

“Even as we succeed in so many important ways, we have our challenges with the NCAA investigation,” the letter noted.

Five Ohio State football players were suspended last December for the first five games of the 2011 season for accepting improper benefits from Columbus tattoo parlor owner Edward Rife. Soon after, while preparing an appeal on behalf of those players, Ohio State discovered emails that showed that Tressel knew of the violations in April 2010 but did not disclose it to his superiors, the compliance department or the NCAA. Instead, he forwarded the first email to an older friend of Pryor’s in his hometown of Jeannette, Pa.

Tressel met with school president Gordon Gee and Smith and was induced to resign on May 30. Luke Fickell, a defensive assistant coach, was elevated to interim head coach.

Pryor, who was also investigated for other improper benefits, announced in June that he would give up his senior season to make himself available for an NFL supplemental draft.

Copyright 2011 by The Associated Press

Amid the media frenzy surrounding the blockbuster trial of Casey Anthony, a number of personal photographs of the defendant have emerged — offering a glimpse into Anthony’s life before she was accused of killing her two-year-old daughter, Caylee Anthony.

-While I’m putting this up here because of my hatred for Casey Anthony and that she is clearly not a person.
-I’m not saying anything Ohio State related… just her wearing these shirts is not great news in the Media for Ohio State again. Clearly not ALL Buckeyes fans are baby killing psychopaths…..

Edward Rife pleads guilty in drug case

Associated Press

COLUMBUS, Ohio — Tattoo parlor owner Edward Rife had a lucrative side business selling hundreds of pounds of marijuana in Columbus, a second job that federal prosecutors say allowed him to pay $21,500 for a luxury SUV.

But Rife’s guilty plea to drug trafficking and money laundering charges Tuesday might have gone unnoticed had federal investigators not stumbled on another of Rife’s sidelines: buying Ohio State memorabilia from football players or giving them discounts on tattoos for the items.

That discovery triggered an NCAA investigation into the school, led to coach Jim Tressel’s forced resignation, the departure of star quarterback Terrelle Pryor and the suspension of four players for the first five games of the upcoming season and one game for a fifth player.

The university is still wrestling with the scandal’s fallout, which could include a variety of NCAA penalties.
“Guilty, your honor,” Rife told U.S. District Court Judge Gregory Frost when asked how he wanted to plead to one count of money laundering and one count of conspiracy to distribute and possess with intent to distribute more than 200 pounds of marijuana.

Afterward, attorney Stephen Palmer tried to distance his client from the scandal.
“He was an unfortunate cog in the wheel,” Palmer said after the hearing. “He had no intention of harming anyone in the program.”

Rife, 31, could face a prison sentence of 20 years for money laundering and up to 40 years for drug trafficking but would likely receive much less under federal sentencing rules. Frost did not set a sentencing date and prosecutors say Rife’s cooperation in an ongoing drug-trafficking investigation could determine the length of sentence.

Rife, owner of Fine Line Ink Tattoos and Body Piercings on the west side of Columbus, was allowed to remain free pending his sentencing.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Kevin Kelley said the government is not assisting with either the NCAA or Ohio State investigations. He also said there was no evidence Ohio State players were involved in the marijuana operation.

In December, Pryor and four other Ohio State players were found to have received cash and discounted tattoos from Rife in exchange for signed Buckeye memorabilia and championship rings. All were permitted by the NCAA to play in the Buckeyes’ 31-26 victory over Arkansas in the Allstate Sugar Bowl, with their five-game suspensions to begin with the first game of the 2011 season. Another player, Jordan Whiting, was suspended for one game.

After the team returned from New Orleans, investigators found that Tressel had learned in April 2010 about the players’ involvement with Rife.

Rife had met with a local attorney and former Ohio State walk-on player, Christopher Cicero, that month to discuss his case but never hired Cicero. Cicero sent Tressel emails detailing the improper benefits, and the two ended up trading a dozen emails on the subject.

Tressel had signed an NCAA compliance form in September saying he had no knowledge of any wrongdoing by athletes. His contract, in addition to NCAA rules, specified that he had to tell his superiors or compliance department about any potential NCAA rules violations.

Tressel, who won a national championship and seven Big Ten titles at Ohio State, resigned May 30. Pryor also has announced he’s leaving Ohio State.

Rife must also forfeit $50,000 in drug proceeds, but if he does that successfully he’ll keep the memorabilia found in his suburban Columbus home. Those include Big Ten championship rings, gold pants pendants, autographed items and parts of football uniforms.

“Investigators could not determine whether the seized Ohio State sports memorabilia had been specifically purchased by Rife with narcotics proceeds,” Robert Bogner, a special agent in the Internal Revenue Service’s criminal investigations unit, testified in court Tuesday.

Bogner said investigators learned of Rife’s drug dealing while investigating a major marijuana and cocaine operation in central Ohio.

Copyright 2011 by The Associated Press

Ohio St gained unfair advantage by cheating – Will the Big Ten further punish them?

Will the Big Ten further punish Ohio State? Last season, Ohio State’s cheating created an unfair advantage for the Buckeyes over fellow conference teams and likely altered the Big Ten’s final standings. The teams that suffered negative consequences were fellow Big Ten Conference teams:

*Michigan State probably would have gone to the Rose Bowl had Ohio State’s players been suspended last season, instead of this season. It is likely that Ohio State would have lost more that one game last year and missed out on a share of the Big Ten title. Also, Michigan State had the tiebreaker advantage over Wisconsin, by virtue of beating them head-to-head. By cheating, Ohio State may have caused Michigan State to miss out on the Rose Bowl, and MSU fell all the way to the Cap One Bowl, which is not prestigious!

*Ohio State got the benefit of participating in the Sugar Bowl. OSU cheats all year, and still reaps the rewards of a BCS Bowl trip. What a joke!

*Ohio State defeated Michigan, Indiana, and Minnesota; all teams that fired their coaches. Ohio State won these games with several players that should have been ineligible. If Rich Rod beats Ohio State last year, then he might still be coaching at Michigan. Which UMich fans might be okay with regardless, as long as Brady Hoke turns out to be the guy to beat Larry Fickz this year, the MATCHUP of the CENTURY, not really… but maybe the start of a new era in the greatest rivalry in College Football.

*Iowa would have probably defeated Ohio State if the ineligible players were not playing. Remember Pryor on the last drive? If Iowa beats Ohio State, then the Hawks might have defeated Minnesota and gone to a better bowl game.

Ohio St. trustee sees cracks in values

COLUMBUS, Ohio — Ohio State needs to do a lot of “soul-searching” in the wake of the memorablia-for-cash and tattoos football scandal that forced coach Jim Tressel to resign and quarterback Terrelle Pryor to leave school, a university trustee said Friday.
After weeks of silence, the oversight panel for Ohio State — a school of more than 50,000 students — is beginning to comment on the memorabilia scandal. It will spend up to six weeks reviewing the athletic department’s entire response to the scandal, though members say they do not know of any other NCAA rules violations right now.

“We have a lot to look at in sort of the soul-searching of what is most important in the game of life,” trustee Jerry Jurgensen, retired chief executive officer of Nationwide Insurance, said in remarks to the full board on Friday.

“The cracks here weren’t really cracks of rules and procedures,” he said. “They were cracks in a value system.”

Jurgensen, often an independent voice on the board, was quickly contradicted by board chairman Les Wexner, billionaire chairman and founder of Limited Brands and a major donor to the university.
“I don’t think we have a lot of soul-searching to do, not at all,” Wexner said. “We have a lot of heart-celebrating to do for the good that this university does.”

Neither Wexner nor Jurgensen would comment after the board meeting. Ohio State president Gordon Gee took Wexner’s side, saying “the university is moving forward and we feel very strongly about the fact that we have much to celebrate today.”

Tressel’s 10-year Ohio State head coaching career, which included a national championship and seven Big Ten titles, ended in disgrace when he stepped down May 30 after failing to tell his superiors that players were getting improper benefits under NCAA rules.

The coach knew players received cash and tattoos for autographs, championship rings and equipment and did not tell anyone at Ohio State or the NCAA for more than nine months. NCAA rules — and Tressel’s contract — specified that he had to disclose any and all information about possible violations.
Wexner defended the board’s silence Friday, saying that, rather than making public pronouncements, trustees decided to devote their energy to working with university administrators to make sure the proper processes, reviews and protocols were in place.

“We’ve got a very sound process of work,” Wexner said.

“I’m pleased and I think the board is pleased with the work to date and the way we’ve progressed that work in an orderly, focused and thorough manner.”

Trustee Robert Schottenstein said on Friday that Ohio State’s athletic compliance program is good but there might be room for improvement.

The program, with eight compliance officers, has added two positions since the scandal broke last December, but those positions were being discussed before the news of the memorabilia sales broke. The program oversees hundreds of athletes, including 85 football players on scholarship.

“The NCAA has been in here a number of times and claimed that our athletic compliance process is outstanding,” Schottenstein said Friday. “They may be right. That doesn’t mean we don’t want to change it, though.”

Copyright 2011 by The Associated Press

The 2010 BCS champion is under NCAA investigation.

The BCS ordered its 2004 champion, found guilty of NCAA violations, to give back its crystal football.
The bowl that hosted the BCS title game in January revealed that its executives went to a strip club and took a golf junket to Pebble Beach on the nonprofit’s American Express.

The U.S. Department of Justice wants answers from the BCS about possible antitrust violations.

Neither QB Terrelle Pryor nor coach Jim Tressel will be back with the Buckeyes after the scandal at Ohio State.

The head coach of the dominant football program in the Big Ten resigned after lying and covering up NCAA violations. The program’s best player, alleged to have sold memorabilia for tattoos and autographs for money, left school — presumably in a new car — last week rather than remain for the second half of his senior season. He already had been suspended for the first five games.

The head coach of the Big East co-champion resigned under pressure last week after reports that he had sabotaged the appointed successor he didn’t want.

And that’s just football. The NCAA has suspended the coach of the men’s basketball champion for the first three games next season, but one scandal-ridden sport at a time. If you’re looking for problems that range from money to politics, from the Pacific Ocean to the Appalachian Mountains, college football lives there.
Judging by the money that networks have pledged over the last year for television rights, college football has never been more popular. And judging by the headlines, the sport is up to its headgear in ethical quicksand.
Once Ohio State coach Jim Tressel, a man who wore his rectitude on his sweater vest, admitted he had misled the NCAA, Diogenes put down his Lantern (the lamp, not the Ohio State student newspaper) and gave up on searching college football for an honest man.

OK, it’s not that bad. But even Texas athletic director DeLoss Dodds, a coach and an athletic administrator who has fueled a 50-year career on natural optimism, said he is concerned.

“There are some things that went wrong,” Dodds said. “They are very public and that’s what people focus on. … The positive side is like 98 percent. The negative side is like 2 percent. But right now we’re swimming in the 2 percent.”

Others are not so optimistic. They see the scandals breaking with the natural rhythm of waves at the shoreline.

“It is very understandable that an element of skepticism, of cynicism, has become part of the current thought process,” SEC commissioner Mike Slive said. “I think [NCAA president] Mark Emmert put it well. We may have lost the benefit of the doubt at the moment with the public.”

There is no common theme to the violations, alleged or proven, listed above. Current BCS champ Auburn remains under the cloud of NCAA investigation. Tennessee has recruiting issues. The BCS vacated USC’s 2004 title. Ohio State came under NCAA scrutiny about players, including now-departed QB Terrelle Pryor, receiving extra benefits. The BCS kept the Fiesta Bowl in its championship rotation, but fined the bowl $1 million for its transgressions. Bill Stewart is out as West Virginia’s coach, replaced by Dana Holgorsen. Ohio State and Tennessee coaches admitted to misleading or lying to the NCAA.

There’s something for everybody. But what, when taken together? Is this a case of the pendulum of human nature swinging back toward the bad old days? Many of today’s coaches are too young to remember the lawless 1980s. Dodds is the last athletic director in place from the late Southwest Conference, which cheated its way into oblivion.

“Oh, not even close,” Dodds said. “The ’80s were worse. The ’80s were as bad as they could get. This pales to what was going on in the ’80s.”

SEC commissioner Mike Slive thinks the sport needs a thorough self-examination.

NCAA vice president David Berst, the lead investigator in the SMU death-penalty case a quarter-century ago, doesn’t suspect that history is repeating itself, either. Berst said that the electronic trail of evidence left behind by most violators has made the NCAA’s job easier. He-said/he-said cases are rarer today. More likely are he-emailed/he-responded cases. That is what tripped up Tressel.

“I would tell you it would be very difficult for me to catch those things,” Berst said. “The agent issues in my day were private and secret. With the advent of social media and instant messaging and the ability to learn so much so fast … I just think probably today it’s more likely that you can uncover [a violation] and treat it in a public way than I was ever able to do. There may be more. There either is more or it’s being uncovered more frequently than I’ve ever been able to do.”

Slive is not quite that sanguine. He called the rash of recent cases an anomaly. But he isn’t saying, “This, too, shall pass.” He called for the industry to perform a thorough self-examination. He pointed to legislation that the SEC passed at its 2010 spring meetings that gave the commissioner power to levy suspensions.
Slive suspended Tennessee men’s basketball coach Bruce Pearl for the Volunteers’ first eight SEC games in the 2010-11 season for knowingly violating NCAA rules regarding contact with prospects and lying to NCAA investigators about it. The university fired him after the season. Given that SEC schools have a long, persistent history with the NCAA enforcement process, Slive believes his police powers represent the change of heart that he hopes all of intercollegiate athletics will go through.

“Some of the things you’ve lumped together that’s created this thing,” Slive said, “has to do with how people behave. We need to hold them accountable. … Part of what all of our folks wanted was to accept our history and be proactive in dealing with it.”

Slive wants to re-establish the public trust that he believes intercollegiate athletics has squandered. What he referred to as the benefit of the doubt is really the veneer of respectability attached to the sometimes sordid and entirely human desire to win at all costs. The benefit of the doubt keeps alive the belief that college sports are different than the pros. It is all the other sports that help produce the doctors and lawyers and teachers who make up the cast of those NCAA commercials we mute before running into the kitchen for a beer and a sandwich.

Those aren’t the sports that generate the revenue. Those also aren’t the sports that generate the headlines or, of late, the headaches. It may be, as Slive put it, an anomaly. But it is also reality.

Ivan Maisel is a senior writer for ESPN.com and hosts the ESPNU College Football podcast. Send your questions and comments to him at Ivan.Maisel@ESPN.com.

SI story reveals 28 players may have been involved in memorabilia trading
By Graham Watson

For hours yesterday, media and a fans sat on pins and needles waiting for Sports Illustrated to publish its highly anticipated story about Jim Tressel and Ohio State football.

When it was finally released, the story showed that the level of improprieties and the numbers involved far exceeded what we’d previously discovered.

According to SI, at least 28 — not just the six who have been suspended — players have traded memorabilia for tattoos, including nine current players and nine former players, who could still count toward Ohio State penalties because of the NCAA’s four-year statute of limitations on violations.

One former Buckeye, defensive end Robert Rose, whose career ended in 2009, told SI that he had swapped memorabilia for tattoos and that “at least 20 others” on the team had done so as well. SI’s investigation also uncovered allegations that Ohio State players had traded memorabilia for marijuana and that Tressel had potentially broken NCAA rules when he was a Buckeyes assistant coach in the mid-1980s.

Last Friday, SI informed Ohio State spokesman Jim Lynch of the new allegations and asked that Tressel be made aware of them. Lynch said the school would have some comment by the end of the day. No comment came, and on Saturday, Lynch told SI to contact Tressel’s lawyer, Gene Marsh, for any response from the coach; Lynch also said he could not confirm that Tressel had been apprised of the new allegations. The implication was clear: Ohio State was distancing itself from Tressel. (E-mails from SI to Tressel and to Marsh and multiple phone messages for Marsh went unanswered.)

The story goes on to recount nearly 30 years worth of improprieties under coach Jim Tressel, including Tressel, back when he was an Ohio State assistant in the early 80s, allegedly fixing a summer camp raffle so elite players would win the best prizes.

It talked about improprieties at Youngstown State, Tressel’s previous head coaching stop and during the past 10 seasons at Ohio State. And while not all of the information was news — ESPN published a similar piece on Tressel back in 2004 — it continued to drive home the overwhelming notion that there has been a pattern of lack of institutional control while Tressel has been at the helm.

As the dust settles after a litany of journalism bombs have been thrown at Tressel and Ohio State, all eyes will turn to the NCAA and the punishment it plans to hand down. Pete Thamel of the New York Times wrote Tuesday morning that the NCAA, which is supposed to hear the Ohio State case on Aug. 12, will likely push back the timeline to ensure every last little morsel comes out about the school and Tressel’s transgressions.
After Tressel and Ohio State get their day in front of the N.C.A.A., it will become clearer whether the recent calls from the new N.C.A.A. president, Mark Emmert, for stiffer penalties for cheats are a reality or just white noise in the face of another scandal.

What’s known in the Tressel case is that he misled the university and the N.C.A.A. about his knowledge of his players receiving improper gifts, essentially allowing star players who should have been ineligible for at least a portion of last season to take the field. And what’s known about Ohio State is that the university seemingly did everything possible to save its coach, first suspending him for only two games and then slowly nudging him down the plank as the allegations and negative publicity loomed larger…

Two issues will figure prominently in how culpable the N.C.A.A. finds Ohio State. The first is how the university explains reports that dozens of players received deals on cars from a local dealership. If Ohio State consistently turned a blind eye to something that was an obvious extra benefit for its players, it could result in serious repercussions.

The university, especially Gee and Smith, will also have to explain why it initially decided to suspend Tressel for just two games when his lying and cover-up appeared worthy of his being fired from the start. In an era when lying to the N.C.A.A., as in the cases of Oklahoma State receiver Dez Bryant and the Tennessee men’s basketball coach Bruce Pearl, has become a mortal sin, Buckeyes administrators will have to justify why they thought Tressel should have missed only games against Akron and Toledo. That’s a punishment essentially comparable to having an N.F.L. coach miss preseason games.

The Sports Illustrated story wasn’t the bomb many expected it to be, but it’s yet another thing the NCAA can point to while it’s deliberating on a punishment. It probably won’t be the death penalty that SMU received in the 80s because that set the program back 25 years and the NCAA can’t afford to do that to a place like Ohio State. But trust that the punishment will be harsher than the one handed out to USC. The Trojans were basically penalized for the actions of one player, the NCAA has at least 18 and a coach to finger at Ohio State.

Ohio State coach Jim Tressel, suspended 2 games, won’t be fired AD says
By The Associated Press

COLUMBUS, Ohio — Ohio State suspended football coach Jim Tressel for two games and fined him $250,000 on Tuesday for violating NCAA rules by failing to notify the school about information he received involving two players and questionable activities involving the sale of memorabilia.

Tressel also will receive a public reprimand and must make a public apology. The NCAA is investigating and could reject the self-imposed penalties and impose additional sanctions.

Ohio State athletics director Gene Smith said he never seriously considered firing Tressel for violating his contract, which specifies that he must immediately report any — the word is underlined in the contract — information which pertains to violations of NCAA, Big Ten or Ohio State bylaws and rules.
“Wherever we end up, Jim Tressel is our football coach,” Smith said. “He is our coach, and we trust him implicitly.”

Last December, the NCAA suspended quarterback Terrelle Pryor and four teammates for the first five games on the 2011 season for selling jerseys, championship rings and trophies to a local tattoo parlor owner. The suspensions came just 16 days after the U.S. attorney told the school of a federal investigation that included players.

The school did not learn until January, however, that Tressel had been tipped off to the federal investigation back in April.

“Obviously I’m disappointed that this happened at all,” Tressel said. “I take my responsibility for what we do at Ohio State tremendously seriously and for the game of football. I plan to grow from this. I’m sincerely saddened by the fact that I let some people down and didn’t do things as well as I possibly could have.”
Yahoo! Sports first reported Tressel’s prior knowledge of the possible improper benefits on Monday.
Tressel said he allowed the two players cited in the e-mail to play the entire 2010 season because he did not want to “interfere with a federal investigation” and worried that sitting eligible players would raise a “whole new set of questions.”

Tressel received an e-mail on April 2, 2010. A person Tressel identified only as “a lawyer,” mentioned that Ohio State players had been implicated in activities with Eddie Rife, a local tattoo-parlor owner. The e-mail, according to Tressel, said players were selling signed Buckeyes memorabilia and giving it to Rife in exchange for money and tattoos. The e-mail said Rife had a criminal record and had witnessed one of his friends being murdered in a parking lot.

The Buckeyes coach said he kept quiet out fear for the safety of the two players connected to the federal, criminal drug-trafficking case. That investigation prompted an Ohio State and NCAA investigation involving players selling memorabilia and getting discounted tattoos.

“I have had a player murdered. I’ve had a player incarcerated. I’ve had a player get taken into the drug culture and lose his opportunity for a productive life,” an emotional Tressel said, tears welling in his eyes, at a news conference on Tuesday night. “It was obviously tremendously concerning. Quite honestly, I was scared.”
Tressel met with Ohio State and NCAA officials in December when the U.S. Attorney’s office disclosed that Pryor, top receiver DeVier Posey, leading rusher Dan “Boom” Herron, offensive lineman Mike Adams and backup defensive lineman Solomon Thomas had provided the memorabilia.

Despite their 2011 five-game suspensions, those five were permitted to play in the Sugar Bowl. With all playing well — Thomas even had the game-saving interception in the final minutes — the Buckeyes beat Arkansas 31-26 in New Orleans.

Shortly after the team returned from the game, the university began reviewing its information on an unrelated legal issue, Smith said Tuesday, and Tressel admitted he had not told everything he knew about his players and their relationship with the tattoo parlor and its owner.

Smith was forced to return to campus Tuesday, skipping meetings with television network officials in New York about this year’s NCAA men’s basketball tournament, to address the NCAA violations. Smith is the chairman of the NCAA’s Division I men’s basketball committee which selects, seeds and brackets the teams.
Tressel is 106-22 in his 10 years as coach of the Buckeyes, with a national championship in 2002.
The Buckeyes open next season with games against Akron and Toledo, likely playing those without their coach and their quarterback.

Ohio State president Gordon Gee said he and Tressel had discussed the violation at Gee’s house for 3 hours one night.

Gee also said he had not considered dismissing the Buckeyes coach.

“No, are you kidding?” he said with a laugh. “Let me be very clear. I’m just hoping the coach doesn’t dismiss me.”

ESPN.com news services
COLUMBUS, Ohio — Andy Geiger is stepping down as athletic director at Ohio State, citing burnout after almost two years of NCAA investigations into the school’s football and basketball programs.

Geiger, whose 11-year tenure included some of the Buckeyes’ greatest victories and biggest embarrassments, said he’ll leave the post June 30. He denied being forced out due to a series of investigations and public stumbles.

Andy Geiger, Ohio State AD since 1994, gets emotional while announcing his retirement.”I can’t help perceptions,” Geiger said at a Wednesday news conference. “We talk a lot about reality and perception. I’m a reality guy. I can’t help what other people’s perceptions are.”

From the time Maurice Clarett led the Buckeyes to a football national championship in 2002, the school’s athletic department has been beset by NCAA investigations.

“I find my work is no longer fun and I no longer look forward with enthusiasm to each day,” Geiger said. “I’m just tired. Just bone-weary. Not the tired that a good night of sleep fixes. ‘Burnout,’ I guess, is what they call it in the industry.”

Geiger, 65, got choked up at one point and took several moments to compose himself. He said the stress of running one of the largest athletic departments in the country led to his decision to leave.

University president Karen Holbrook said Geiger will stay at the school until June 2006 as a fund-raiser and consultant. Geiger, who held the post since 1994, has 17 months left on his contract.

After leading Ohio State to the national title as a freshman, Clarett was suspended for lying to investigators during an NCAA probe of allegations that he received improper benefits from a family friend.

Clarett has accused football coach Jim Tressel of setting him up with cars, said boosters provided him with no-show jobs and that Ohio State professors gave breaks to football players.

A search of court records by The Associated Press revealed at least 14 arrests involving 14 football players in the period following Tressel’s hiring in January 2001 and May 2004. Others, such as quarterback Troy Smith and running back Lydell Ross, were suspended for at least one game following other disciplinary problems.
David Kenner, Clarett’s attorney, told ESPN the Magazine’s Tom Friend that by stepping down, Geiger has vindicated his client.

“It’s clear that Mr. Geiger’s perception of Maurice was a biased one, considering that as soon as there was an outpouring of unsolicited corroboration supporting Maurice’s account, Mr. Geiger was forced to quickly admit that Maurice’s statements were not without merit.

“While I am certain that no one takes any joy in Mr. Geiger’s sudden resignation, it, together with other recent events would cause one to finally view Maurice Clarett in a completely different and favorable light, as painful as that must be for Mr. Geiger to concede.”

Last month, the school imposed a one-year postseason tournament ban on its men’s basketball team over an alleged $6,000 payment to a recruit by former coach Jim O’Brien.

Holbrook said the firing of O’Brien on June 8 was the first step in appeasing NCAA investigators. She and Geiger said more penalties may be coming.

There have been numerous calls for Geiger to step down for all that has happened at Ohio State on his watch. He’s satisfied that the timing is right for his decision.

“People have called for my job before,” Geiger said. “Maybe because we lost a bunch of football games or some other decision. In this environment, it’s been especially hard.

“It’s the best thing for me and it’s healthy for Ohio State. “I don’t think it does damage to Ohio State, but I know it’s the best thing for me.”

Information from The Associated Press was used in this report.