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Missouri’s punishment exposes the NCAA’s twisted priorities

NCAA is apoplectic about overeager tutor, apathetic about enabling sex abuse.

KNOXVILLE, TN - NOVEMBER 17: Drew Lock #3 of the Missouri Tigers throws the ball during the second half of the game between the Missouri Tigers and the Tennessee Volunteers at Neyland Stadium on November 17, 2018 in Knoxville, Tennessee. Missouri won the game 50-17. (Photo by Donald Page/Getty Images)
KNOXVILLE, TN - NOVEMBER 17: Drew Lock #3 of the Missouri Tigers throws the ball during the second half of the game between the Missouri Tigers and the Tennessee Volunteers at Neyland Stadium on November 17, 2018 in Knoxville, Tennessee. Missouri won the game 50-17. (Photo by Donald Page/Getty Images)

Over the past 24 hours, two reports have surfaced about rule violations, one at Michigan State, the other at the University of Missouri. How the NCAA responded to the two vastly different cases offers a troubling glimpse at the organization’s wildly misplaced priorities.

An entire athletics department enabling the sexual abuse of hundreds of people, many of them student-athletes, over the span of two decades? No big deal. A single tutor, acting alone, completing coursework for 12 student-athletes over a one-year period? Lock the school up, and throw away the key.

Let’s start with Missouri. According to an NCAA report released on Thursday, in 2015 and 2016, a rogue tutor at the University of Missouri completed math coursework for 12 Missouri athletes across three different sports. For this unforgivable sin, the NCAA has put Missouri on a three-year probation; imposed a ban on the 2019 postseason for both softball and baseball, as well as a potential football bowl game; and a 10-year ban from working in college athletics for the tutor.

Any way you look at it, this is an extraordinarily harsh punishment, particularly considering that the NCAA confirmed on a conference call that all evidence indicates the tutor acted without direction from the rest of the athletics department.

Meanwhile, on Wednesday, ESPN’s Outside the Lines reported that a U.S Department of Education investigation into Michigan State’s handling of allegations against former team doctor Larry Nassar — who sexually abused hundreds of women and girls at MSU and USA Gymnastics under the guise of medical treatment — concluded that the university systemically failed to comply with federal requirements that exist to ensure a safe campus.

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In particular, the report reveals four previously unreported instances in which Nassar survivors complained about his “treatments” to MSU officials, only to have their concerns summarily dismissed. The report stresses that at least three of these MSU officials were employees of the athletics department — an associate director of athletics, a strength and conditioning coach, and an athletic trainer.

This brings the number of MSU officials who were warned of Nassar’s abuse before he was arrested in late 2016 to around 20, including former MSU gymnastics coach Kathy Klages and multiple athletic trainers through the years. According to the DOE report, some of those employees still work at MSU.

And yet, last year, an NCAA inquiry found that none of this was a violation of NCAA rules. Michigan State received no probation, no postseason bans, no reprimand of any significance.

It’s a good thing that, while he sexually assaulted the unpaid, teenaged student athletes in his care, he didn’t also complete some of their math assignments. That would have been a real disgrace.

None of this is comes as a shock, of course. The NCAA was also deafeningly silent about the death of University of Maryland football player Jordan McNair, who died during a practice last May in large part due to the coaching staff’s negligence. But that doesn’t make it any less frustrating, or perplexing. In fact, the Missouri sanctions are particularly head-scratching given the fact that the University of North Carolina escaped relatively unscathed from a much worse academic scandal.

Missouri plans to appeal the harsh sanctions immediately.

“The Committee on Infractions has abused its discretion in applying penalties in this case, and the University will immediately appeal this decision that has placed unfair penalties on our department and programs,” the university said in a statement. “It is hard to fathom that the University could be cited for exemplary cooperation throughout this case, and yet end up with these unprecedented penalties that could unfairly and adversely impact innocent current and future Mizzou student-athletes.”

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Meanwhile, Michigan State will await its punishment from the DOE, which will likely involve a hefty fine. But its NCAA eligibility will remain perfectly in tact.