NCAA Coaching Changes

The NCAA is very, very strict (or at least it tries to be) with its' athletes, especially college basketball players. The NCAA does not allow the players to receive any compensation for their play (even though the NCAA and the schools make billions of dollars from the networks that televise the games), they force the players to keep decent grades even though they travel all over the country during the week to play games and they also force players to sit out a year before transfering to another school. I am not going to argue the first two points. Although I feel like the players should receive some form of spending money (something like $200-$300 a month) and that they need to come up with a better way for the athletes to actually get educations (more emphasis on summer school for example), that is for another day. My biggest problem is the fact that in almost every case, if a player wants to leave one school for another, he must sit out a year before becoming eligible to play. I know the NCAA has their reasons for this but those reasons are not fair. It's hypocritical. I mean, they let the coaches go wherever they want with no restrictions -- why must the athletes suffer when the men who bring them to one college can leave for the next situation with no consequences. Some time this afternoon, the University of Kentucky will announce that former (as of this morning) Texas A&M coach Billy Gillispie will be their new coach. Gillispie, who reached an agreement with A&M last week on a new contract, will not be sitting out the year before coaching any games at UK. Before going after Gillispie, Kentucky tried to seduce Billy Donovan, coach of the two-time defending National Champions at Florida and a former UK assistant coach under Rick Pitino, but he decided Florida was a better situation. Kentucky then turned its' attention to Rick Barnes of Texas but he said he was not interested. Yesterday, Bob Huggins left Kansas State, where he coached one year, for his alma mater, West Virginia. No matter that he had recruited in some of the best high school talent in the country to Manhattan, Kansas, Huggins left for what he thought was a better opportunity. Just like his predecessor at West Virginia, John Beilein, left for a better opportunity at Michigan earlier this week. One coach this week, Dana Altman, left Creighton for Arkansas, only to return to Creighton. Altman cited "family reasons" for his decision to return to mid-major power Creighton. I'm sure the fact that two Arkansas players tested positive for drugs and another is in academic trouble had nothing to do with his choice to accept and then turn down an SEC school with a National Championship (1994) on its' resume. Now don't get me wrong. These coaches have every right to move on to a better paying job that theoretically offers them a better chance of winning the top prize. Once upon a time before he turned down the "Roman Empire of College Basketball" (what Pitino called Kentucky), Donovan left Marshall University for Florida. It happens. The problem is that if a player wants to move on, he almost always has to miss a year of basketball to do so. Ron Lewis, the sharp shooting senior guard for Ohio State was once a player at Bowling Green University. He decided after his sophomore year that he could play at a higher level than Bowling Green and the Mid-American Conference could offer. He contacted the new coach at Ohio State, Thad Matta (who had just used a run to the Elite Eight as Xavier's coach to land the big money position at OSU), and asked if there were any spots. Matta gave Lewis a scholarship but before he sat out an entire season before suiting up for the Buckeyes. Matta, who had just bailed on Xavier, coached right from the first game. It's not right. Coaches don't want their players leaving early for the NBA but when they get a shot at the big money of a big time school, they very rarely say no. It is time for the NCAA to allow players to leave one college for another if that is what they want to do. Stop being hypocrites and even out the system.