NCAA Transfer Portal Update Also changing effective Thursday: the NCAA transfer portal, where players must have registered by June 30 to be able to play immediately in 2021-22 instead of sitting a season.Here are the numbers of outbound transfers per Big East school:
Whither The Kenner League? A week removed from its traditional opening, the Kenner League summer basketball series is conspicuous in its absence from the summer sports discussion. So what's up?Founded in 1981, the Kenner League is among the nation's oldest and most recognized summer leagues, but three factors continue to work against a league this summer:1.The District of Columbia continues to prohibit "high contact sports" unless previously approved and including an approved health and safety plan. Kenner, which is administered by outside volunteers and not Georgetown University, needs to have that health and safety plan in place before they can petition the NCAA for the certification of the league, which is required for student athletes with a 75 mile ratio to participate. As of Thursday, the Kenner League (aka "Nike Pro-City Washington") has not been authorized. 2. The University placed strict limits for all on-campus visitors during COVID, and large portions of this policy remain in effect over the summer. (For example, GU is not running any summer programs for high school students on campus.) While a handful of in-person recruiting visits with the basketball office have taken place, they have likely followed testing protocols established by the University. The presence of a third party and their general liability for testing large numbers of athletes may be out of bounds as far as Georgetown's tolerance goes for potentially allowing unvaccinated guests on University property. (Georgetown will require all students and faculty to be vaccinated as a course of being on campus this fall.) 3. Relocating to other sites in the District face the same health and safety plans outlined in point one, above. The league's social media has been quiet as well. The last active Twitter post was June 18 and has not discussed any news on 2021. The last Facebook post was in 2019. All in all, it's not out of the question, but the window is narrowing on getting it done. As of next weekend there are roughly seven weeks remaining in the summer session to schedule a five to six week league series completing no later than August 15. Georgetown: No Gavitt Games In 2021-22 Georgetown will not participate in this season's Big East-Big Ten Gavitt Games, per a release.The eight game series rotates through schools in each conference, guaranteeing each Big East school six appearances in an eight year period. With this absence, Georgetown has four appearances in the first six seasons, and thus it would have games in the 2022-23 and 2023-24 season. However, the loss of a major opponent from the Big Ten could have an impact on the Hoyas' non-conference NET rankings, where GU was just 3-9 versus Quad 1 opponents last season.Also rotating off for 2021-22 for the Big Ten: Maryland, but it is very unlikely the two teams would meet on their own. More likely, Georgetown will fill the date with a low-tier Division I opponent. NCAA v. Allston - What Does It Mean? Monday's decision by the U.S. Supreme Court was the biggest setback to the NCAA since losing its TV rights monopoly in 1984, but what does it mean?In a 9-0 decision, the Court rejected the argument by the NCAA that restricted enhanced educational benefits to athletes, such as unlimited grad school tuition or free study-abroad, as a violation of antitrust."[The] decision in NCAA v. Alston ended a dispute that began seven years ago as a class action filed against the NCAA and the major athletic conferences by the athletes who play Division I football and basketball," wrote attorney and professor Amy Howe (G'94, L'98) in this link to SCOTUS Blog. "The athletes contended in their complaint that the NCAA's restrictions on eligibility and compensation violate federal antitrust laws by barring the athletes from receiving fair-market compensation for their labor. A federal district court in California agreed in part: It ruled that the NCAA could restrict benefits that are unrelated to education (such as cash salaries), but it barred the NCAA from limiting education-related benefits. After the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit upheld that decision, the NCAA and the athletic conferences went to the Supreme Court, which late last year agreed to take up the case." Justice Kavanaugh's concurrence notwithstanding, the decision does not mandate paying players or unionizing athletes. Georgetown is well aware of the impacts of the case, but is unlikely to comment given that Georgetown president Jack DeGioia (C'79, G'95) is the chairman of the NCAA Board of Governors. In a brief statement, the NCAA remarked that "While today's decision preserves the lower court ruling, it also reaffirms the NCAA's authority to adopt reasonable rules and repeatedly notes that the NCAA remains free to articulate what are and are not truly educational benefits, consistent with the NCAA's mission to support student-athletes. "Even though the decision does not directly address name, image and likeness, the NCAA remains committed to supporting [name, image and likeness] benefits for student-athletes," said NCAA President Mark Emmert. "Additionally, we remain committed to working with Congress to chart a path forward, which is a point the Supreme Court expressly stated in its ruling." Mohammed Forgoes Team TrialsCiting an undisclosed setback, freshman guard Aminu Mohammed (C'25) will not be participating in the Nigerian national team trials, per a tweet below.— Shawn Harmon (@Harmon64S) June 20, 2021 Tagliabue Discusses "Fixed" 1961 Game In an interview with USA Today discussing the growing ties between sports and gambling interests, former NFL commissioner Paul Tagliabue (C'62) referenced a 1961 basketball game that was part of a wide ranging criminal investigation."I played in a college basketball game that was fixed," Tagliabue told USA Today's Jarrett Bell, referencing a 1961 game at Madison Square Garden against NYU. "We beat the hell out of NYU. It was the biggest victory in my three years of basketball at Georgetown. Turns out that guys at NYU were taking money to shave points."A guard on that NYU team, Ray Paprocky, was charged in 1961 with accepting $1,300 to affect the outcomes of four games in the 1960-61 season. The Hoyas, who had lost to NYU by 22 the season before, trounced the Violets 92-69 at Madison Square Garden. A look back on that game is available in this link to the Georgetown Basketball History Project. Tagliabue is concerned that technology by itself cannot solve the lure of easy money. "The thing that bothers me, fast-forward, when the Supreme Court ruling came down, there were television people and others who told me that with the technology that's available now, with computers and the ability to sort data to see where the money is going, it would be easier now to spot point-shaving than it was previously," Tagliabue said. "I still worry about some young guy...and someone says to him, take the money," Tagliabue added. "With banners and ads all over stadiums and TV broadcasts glorifying gambling, one could easily imagine a player thinking nothing of affecting the game illegally in exchange for money," wrote Ron Borges at Sports Illustrated. "Not tanking the game, just making sure the spread is not covered or fantasy points are piled up, or denied, some highly productive player. Far-fetched? Perhaps so, but in 1961 Paul Tagliabue felt the same way about a basketball game in which his team trounced a good NYU team only to learn later the fix was in. If one minimizes the damage of such a moment, you miss the warning Tagliabue gave this week." Schedule Update A two game series between Georgetown and South Carolina was announced Tuesday.The Hoyas will travel to Columbia, SC to meet the Gamecocks (6-15 in 2020-21) on Dec. 5, with a return game at Capital One Arena in the 2022-23 season. It's an opportunity for two Georgetown players, junior Malcolm Wilson and grad transfer Kaiden Rice, to play in their home town."I can't express how excited I am to be able to play a game against a program like Georgetown, led by one of the great people in the game of basketball in Patrick Ewing," USC coach Frank Martin said in a news release. "Georgetown is coming off of a great run last year, an NCAA Tournament run, and it's one of the historic programs that in my lifetime, we all grew up respecting. Coach Thompson, even though he's not with us in person anymore, the spirit and the strength that he built the Georgetown program on, we all still look to his example in college basketball as we try to grow the game and grow the people who play the game. Being able to start this series is going to be great for our program, for basketball and for everyone who will be a part of it." Georgetown holds a 4-1 lead in the series, last playing the Gamecocks in the third round of the 2005 NIT. The two schools played a home and away series 20 years ago during the 2001-02 and 2002-03 seasons. Jerome Williams Founds NIL Agency First, ignore the egregious typo at the end of the fourth paragraph of this article from Forbes.com. Then, learn more about the efforts of Jerome Williams (C'96) to establish a consulting agency for NCAA players at the onset of the "name, image and likeness" era, or NIL.NIL is an emerging concept where student-athletes will be allowed to monetize any agreements that seek their name, image and likeness, from t-shirts to social media endorsements. The pool of players a third party is realistically going to engage is fairly small and far smaller at Georgetown, but it is being promoted as a matter of fairness in revenue sports, mostly I-A/FBS football and men's basketball.Williams' firm, Alumni Pros Global Sports, "enables all levels of athletes to increase the value and control of their personal IP including, but not limited to, their image, name and likeness within facilities, leagues, non-profits, media networks, product brands, and innovative technologies," according to its web site. There is no national standard for NIL, and numerous state measures are sprouting up which may or may not be in conflict with a pending NCAA or federal standard. Still, some schools are using NIL as a positive benefit for their athletes, particularly at larger state schools. "College athletics is entering a new era and we are excited to embrace the opportunities that will come with changes in student-athletes' name, image and likeness rights, said a University of Wisconsin spokesperson. "At our core, we exist to prepare student-athletes. Our approach to preparing them for success in the NIL arena will be no different than our commitment to setting them up for success on the field of play, in the classroom and in life beyond their time at UW." Eighteen states, including Maryland, have some form of a NIL bill passed. Virginia does not, and the District of Columbia would likely require a federal bill before it is legally practical to do so. "It has definitely been a learning experience all the way through," said former St. John's (MN) football player Jackson Erdmann, a member of an NCAA working group studying the issue. A lot was going on in those working group meetings. We would be in a conference room, and I'm sitting at the table and across from me are Gene Smith and Val Ackerman, very high-up officials. Jack DeGioia, the president of Georgetown, was sitting next to me, and I had to whisper some questions to him every once in a while. Definitely one of my biggest takeaways is just how complex this issue is. "I believe there are going to be changes no matter what happens, especially with the California legislation and other states acting on it now. So if we just sit back and relax, it's going to be absolute chaos. With a free market, no regulations, that just leaves room for absolute chaos. It would get out of control real fast. We have to work through the reality of where we're at and start acting on how the NCAA can change the rules and regulations to help fit the student-athletes and society right now." John Marinatto (1957-2021) John Marinatto, third commissioner of the Big East Conference from 2009-2012, died Saturday at the age of 64, according to various reports."We were very saddened to learn of the passing of John Marinatto, former Big East Commissioner and former Director of Athletics at Providence College," read a statement from the conference. "John was a dedicated and caring administrator who regarded the interests of student-athletes as the highest priority. John served the Big East and the college sports world admirably and will always have a special place in our conference's history. We extend our deepest condolences to his family."Marinatto, a 1979 graduate of Providence College, was the third consecutive commissioner to come from the PC athletic department, beginning as the school's sports information director when Dave Gavitt was athletic director, and following Gavitt as athletic director from 1987 to 2001. Marinatto then served as associate commissioner at the conference under Mike Tranghese and ascended to the commissioner's role in 2009 during a period of growing instability in the conference. While Tranghese was seen as adept at keeping the cold war between the Big East's football and basketball schools to a simmer, Marinatto was not as successful and subsequently lost the faith of the football schools. Marinatto was unable to gain consensus on the abortive contract discussions with NBC and ESPN in 2010 and 2011 and saw the departure of Syracuse, Pittsburgh, and West Virginia in 2011. Marinatto subsequently invited a number of disparate schools to shore up the Big East's status as a BCS football conference: some that declined (Boise State, San Diego State), one that accepted and then left before joining (TCU), and a number that eventually formed the core of the American Athletic Conference, among them Memphis, SMU, Houston, Temple, Navy and Central Florida. Marinatto resigned in May 2012, although reports suggested he was asked to resign by the league's presidents. "The conference was susceptible to be raided," Mike Tranghese told The Associated Press. "When something goes wrong, the person in that chair is the one to take the hit." In 2017, Marinatto served as a special assistant to the commissioner of the Colonial Athletic Association. A cause of death was not provided. Sibley To UTEP Four weeks since announcing a transfer from Georgetown, forward Jamari Sibley will enroll at the University of Texas-El Paso.
Sibley averaged 1.2 points per game in 21 appearances with the Hoyas in 2020-21. The Miners return four starters from a 12-12 team in 2020-21, welcoming Sibley, two junior college additions, and a freshman from France to backfill five players lost to the NCAA transfer portal. 40 Years Of DC's "Cold War" "A total of 6,800 feet separate the borders of Georgetown University and George Washington University, but it may as well be a thousand miles."That's a quote from the Georgetown Basketball History Project in 2018 on the state of relations between these two local universities, which have not met on the hard court in 40 years. Academically and athletically, it's as if the two schools barely acknowledge one another.Athletically, GW sponsors every sport Georgetown does except football, field hockey, men's lacrosse, and women's golf. Matchups between the Colonials and Hoyas are common in sports such as baseball and tennis, but men's basketball remains at a visible impasse: the most recent meeting between the schools was 1,495 games ago. In the 93rd game of the series, Georgetown defeated George Washington, 61-48, on December 16, 1981, before 8,695 at Capital Centre during Patrick Ewing's freshman season. The series was not renewed in 1982-83 and neither school has proffered the cause for the decision. In 2006, the GW Hatchet newspaper stated that "GW's athletic staff, which formulates the schedule, decided to end the series for unknown reasons." When Ewing held his introductory press conference as head coach on April 6, 2017, the second question he faced was from the late Mark Plotkin, asking Ewing if he would support a proposed "Ward Two Classic" between the schools. "That is something I'm not at liberty to discuss right now," Ewing said. "That's something that Lee {Reed] and I would sit down and discuss when the time is appropriate", and it's the last time Georgetown has publicly discussed it. There are many suspects in these battles (old feuds, scheduling disputes, gate revenues, the demise of the BB&T Classic, etc.) but no single culprit; regardless, in the last 10 seasons Georgetown has scheduled a grand total of three home games with Howard, two with American, one with Maryland, and none with George Washington. (This doesn't even begin to explain why Georgetown and George Mason do not play. The Hoyas played at GMU in December 1985, and the Patriots never returned a game since.) While Georgetown will be filling out its 2021-22 home schedule this summer with the likes of Radford and Maryland-Eastern Shore amidst empty seats at Capital One Arena, these nearest of neighbors continue to ignore each other. Moving Day The Georgetown's men's basketball players returned to campus this weekend. And this year, they have some company.For the first time since World War II, Georgetown is launching an major summer program, this time for the class of 2024. The program, called the Summer Hilltop Immersion Program (SHIP), will welcome 600 sophomores who were not allowed on campus as freshmen during the previous school year due to COVID-19."SHIP will include academic, experiential learning and social activities for the students to participate in over the summer," reads its web site. "The program will be a five-week residential program that will require students to register for at least five academic credits and live in dormitory housing, including a full access meal plan." Unvaccinated students in the SHIP program will be quarantined upon arrival. The University will mandate al students to show proof of vaccination for the fall. Most, but not all, of the 2021-22 roster were featured on an Instagram post welcoming the players to campus. The inevitable question about Kenner League summer basketball should be answered within two weeks. The group that runs Kenner tends to file paperwork with the NCAA in mid-June for the event, which will likely run five weeks from the first week of July through the second week of August. Attendance at the event will likely depend on the status of DC COVID restrictions as well as whether the University will be open to visitors during this time. Schedule Update A second consecutive home game awaits Georgetown in the Big East-Big 12 challenge series, per reports.After hosting 11th ranked West Virginia at McDonough Gymnasium last season, the Hoyas will host Texas Christian (12-14 in 2020-21) on Saturday, December 18 at Capital One Arena.But unlike marquee Big East-Big 12 matchups such as Villanova-Baylor, Connecticut-West Virginia, or St. John's-Kansas, this game figures to get a lot less attention. The Dec. 18 game will be the last of the 10 game series for 2021, eight of which will finish by Dec. 9. The date, which is likely a result of conflicts with the Wizards and/or Capitals, will place the game against a busy bowl schedule on TV, with six football bowls scheduled that day. It is also the first day after fall 2021 exams have concluded, meaning most students will have already left campus by the weekend. Like Georgetown, TCU finished eighth in their conference, marking the first losing season in the career of Jamie Dixon (424-193), last seen to Georgetown fans as the head coach at Pittsburgh from 2003-2016. The Horned Frogs return just two starters and only five lettermen from the entire 2020-21 team, having lost 10 of its 15 players to the transfer portal (three freshmen, four sophomores, two juniors, one senior). Dixon has already recruited seven from the portal in response, including four star freshman guard Micah Peavy, himself one of nine departures from Texas Tech after coach Chris Beard left for Texas. This is the first meeting between the schools. Here are the other games on the list:  Bile: No Fifth Year Following in the trend of Jahvon Blair and Jamorko Pickett, graduate transfer Chudier Bile has confirmed he will not return to Georgetown in 2021-22.The announcement was made on Twitter Monday evening.Bile averaged 10.2 points per game for the season, shooting 40 percent from the floor, 39 percent from three, and 68 percent from the line. Three games of 19 points, the latter at the 2021 Big East final versus Creighton, matched his season high. Bile's status as a student going forward is not clear. He was not listed on the commencement broadcast for the graduate school, but could come back to complete his degree as Terrell Allen (G'21) did this past year. Bile's departure confirms Georgetown will lose its four top scorers from the 2020-21 roster, the first loss of its kind in the modern era. |