Strange new NCAA transfer rule has everybody saying 'What??'

[dirty]

May 24, 2006 By Gregg Doyel CBS SportsLine.com Senior Writer Tell Gregg your opinion!

Word is starting to leak about a bizarre new NCAA rule that will go down as one of the worst ideas in recent college sports history -- a rule that could make a free agent of the leading returning scorer in college basketball.

Here comes the rule, and as you read it, keep in mind that this is not a joke. This is not fiction. This is real, and this is the rule: A student-athlete who earns an undergraduate degree in four years but still has one year of eligibility remaining -- a medical redshirt, for example -- can transfer into another college's graduate school and finish his or her career there ... immediately. No sitting out a year. It's graduate, transfer and play.
Like a lot of NCAA legislation -- the eight-and-five scholarship limit comes to mind -- this rule (called Proposal 2005-54) was written with good intentions. According to the NCAA's Legislative Review Committee, "A student-athlete who earned his or her undergraduate degree has achieved the primary goal of graduation and should be permitted to choose a graduate school that meets both his or her academic and athletics interests, regardless of his or her previous transfer history."
Sounds nice, doesn't it? Sounds fair. Sounds sweet.
It sucks.
Here's why:
What about the school that loses little Johnny Overachiever? This is the kind of rule that sounds good until you put a face on it, and that face belongs to Gary Neal of Towson. Neal, who averaged 26.1 points last season, is the top returning scorer in Division I. He's a 6-foot-4 shooting guard who hit 40 percent of his 3-pointers, 80 percent of his free throws, and pitched in 2.9 assists per game. He's also a transfer from La Salle who has graduated in four years but has one year of eligibility left.
Towson's the school that took a chance on Neal, who left La Salle amid allegations of rape (he was found not guilty in November). Towson's the school that helped Neal graduate. Towson's the school that should reap the benefits of Neal's fourth and final year of eligibility.
Not UConn, not Oklahoma, not any of the heavy hitters said to be lining up for Neal. And that list will grow longer as more coaches learn about this misguided rule.
CBS SportsLine.com on Wednesday asked six coaches from five different leagues if they knew about the new rule, which went into effect on April 27. Only two did. The other four couldn't believe what they were hearing.
"You're kidding," said one coach from the Big East. "That's got to be the dumbest rule I've ever heard."
"That's (expletive)," said another coach, this one from the Atlantic 10. "That can't be right."
Not even an employee of the NCAA could believe this new NCAA rule. CBS SportsLine.com contacted the NCAA on Wednesday to verify that Proposal 2005-54 says what it appears to say. The responding NCAA spokesman, whose name will be omitted to protect him or her, was skeptical but began looking up Proposal 2005-54. After a minute of silence, here's what came out of the NCAA spokesman's mouth:
"Wow. Yeah. That's what it says. OK, well, that's news to me."
It's news to a lot of people, but not to Memphis coach John Calipari. He has known about this rule for a week -- which puts him ahead of the curve -- because Conference USA coaches were told last week during the league's spring meetings in Destin, Fla. The news was broken by Rice coach Willis Wilson, a ranking member of the National Association of Basketball Coaches.
"We were like, 'Huh?'" Calipari says. "We didn't understand, because the rule makes no sense."
Already, multiple sources told CBS SportsLine.com that athletics directors are mobilizing to get an emergency hearing on Proposal 2005-54. However many signatures such a petition would require to get the NCAA moving -- 50 athletics directors, 75, 100 -- won't be a problem to obtain, the sources said.
This dark cloud of a rule has a silver lining, though, and to understand it, let's give it another face. This face belongs to one of Calipari's players, Almamy Thiero, a 6-10, 255-pound center whose Memphis career has been undermined by health issues. Thiero has graduated in four years but has one year of eligibility left. He could stay at Memphis and play garbage minutes next season. Or he could go to a smaller school -- say Valparaiso -- and play a lot. And play immediately.
Thiero's a good example. Neal's a bad example. And in this case, the bad outweighs the good.
Let's put another face on this new rule. Taylor Coppenrath's face. In 2000-01, Coppenrath was an awkward freshman forward at Vermont. He redshirted. Four years later, he graduated. He also was a two-time conference player of the year, one of the best players in college basketball, and he had a year of eligibility left thanks to his redshirt season. Had this rule been in effect in 2004-05, Coppenrath could have transferred from Vermont to, say, Kansas and enrolled in graduate school there and played the 2004-05 season for the Jayhawks.
Good for Kansas, but what about Vermont? The school found Coppenrath. Nurtured him. Developed him. Graduated him. And then, in what should have been his ultimate payoff season, Vermont could lose him?
Bad rule. Bad. Eliminate it now, NCAA.

[SHAWN GOTTI]

U CAN BLAME THIS ON THE JEWS!!!!