Syr-accused: Boeheim Has Wins Revoked and Suspension

(Rich Barnes-USA Today Sports)

Last Friday, March 6, news broke regarding Syracuse University’s basketball team on accounts of academic fraud and misconduct after an eight year investigation by the NCAA.  Under Jim Boeheim, coach of the Orange for 39 seasons with a .744 win record and an excess of 950 wins, Syracuse will be facing various penalties for their malpractices.  Boeheim will be suspended for nine ACC games in the coming 2015-2016 season, and will have 108 game wins revoked from his coaching record.

Over the past decade, according to the NCAA, Syracuse has committed a number of misdemeanors in regards to academic misconduct and non-compliance.  Some of the violations include a lack of adequate drug testing and breaches on academic authenticity of the student-athletes.  According to Syracuse, drug testing was deemed as “confusing”, and was not followed properly when examining student-athletes.  Arguably, the most deceitful practice coming from the Men’s Basketball team is the use of student-tutors to complete the schoolwork for the athletes.  These tutors even went to the extent of contacting professors from student accounts regarding assignments and exams.  With similar cases at UNC with athletes taking courses that did not require attendance and just merely required essays that granted good grades, academic non-compliance amongst sports teams is something that is often overlooked and brushed under the rug.  This has allowed many athletes to slip through the cracks, augmenting the success of athletic teams at the expense of ethics and academics.

With these said allegations, the future of the Syracuse Men’s Basketball team is somewhat ambiguous.  But what is most important is the ethics of college sports teams across the country today.  Day in and day out, universities are preaching the presence of ethics in our daily lives, but it seems that the staffs of specific athletics teams are lacking integrity themselves, opposing the teachings of these respective institutions.  When a staff is corrupt, their practices trickle down to the players, adversely affecting all who are involved.  When academics are breached, not only is the student and the staff cheating the system, but they are also cheating themselves.  Sports lose their appeal when they lack authenticity, which is why compliance is so important.