SMU Players Angered by Penalties : Some Blame NCAA, Others Point to Overzealous Boosters

SMU’s Mustangs were called together Wednesday morning at Ownby Stadium, an on-campus practice facility, to learn the fate of the university’s football program. When they emerged two hours later, they were players without a team.

Most of them knew it even before they arrived at Ownby. The news was on the radio. But they wanted to hear the official announcement, which told them the NCAA will not allow SMU to play football next season.

The players are free to stay at SMU and complete their educations or go to another university, where they will become immediately eligible to play.

“A lot of programs won’t take an SMU athlete,” offensive tackle David Richards said. “They think they can’t afford us.”

Richards, perhaps the Mustangs’ best player, had tried to avoid a mob of reporters outside Ownby Stadium.

“Got to go to class,” he said.

But even though he is quick for someone who weighs 300 pounds, he could not elude the reporters.

Asked about a rumor that he already has committed to Texas A&M; for his senior year, he said: “That’s what I heard on the radio this morning. Not even I knew I was going to do that.”

Richards, from Dallas, explained his dilemma. He said he needs to play his senior season to attract the pro scouts. At the same time, he is concerned that if he transfers he won’t be able to return to SMU for the hours he needs to complete his business degree.

“Everybody has a lot of questions,” he said.

He said he wasn’t angry at anyone, but he didn’t hide his resentment toward former teammate David Stanley, who last October told a local television reporter that he had received $25,000 to sign with SMU and $750 a month until he withdrew from the university.

Stanley had admitted as much to the NCAA a week earlier, opening the latest investigation.

“David Stanley did what he thought was right,” Richards said. “But what goes around, comes around. He’ll get his someday.”

SMU’s own investigation revealed that 12 other players also received under-the-table payments, three of whom are still in school. The university has not identified them even to the NCAA.

But Richards said he did not begrudge those players.

“It’s not the players who are causing the problems; it’s the boosters who give them the money,” Richards said.

“If you get out of high school and somebody says they’re going to give you a car, what are you going to say? Bleep you? No, you’re going to take the car.”

As he reached his own car, Richards seemed almost glad to have SMU in his rear-view mirror.

“There’s a lot of things here that have needed to be corrected for a long time,” he said. “The whole program needs to be restructured. That won’t include me.”

Another player who will be coveted by most other universities, wide receiver Jeffrey Jacobs from Dallas, was told there was a rumor that rival coaches had checked into hotel rooms near the campus and were receiving prospects.

“If they are, I’d like to hear about it,” he said.

Jacobs said he expects as many as 30 players to transfer.

“Most of us came here to play football,” he said. “If I didn’t have football, I wouldn’t be in school.”

Defensive back Mark Vincent, a senior from Fort Worth, was one of the more outspoken players.

“College football is not supposed to be this way,” he said. “College football is supposed to be fun, atmosphere and college girls and everything. This isn’t fun.”

He blamed the NCAA for its rules that allow universities to give athletes who live on campus only $28 a month during the school year.

“Athletes need money, not $1,000 a month, but enough to enjoy college life,” he said.

“Couldn’t they compensate us with $100 a month? That would at least allow us to have our cars fixed if they break down. It might cut out a lot of players taking under-the-table money.”

Vincent said he was not surprised by the severity of the punishment.

“The NCAA passed the death-penalty rule,” he said. “I knew if it came to this, they would use us as an example.”

David Bryan, a junior defensive tackle from Corpus Christi, Tex., also was resigned to that. He even understood it.

“If you don’t start here,” he said, “where do you start?”

David Lott, a commercial real estate developer in Dallas and a prominent alumnus, watched the players file out of Ownby Stadium.

He said the victims were not the teams that SMU gained an advantage over by cheating. The victims, he said, were SMU’s players. Of the 52 remaining on scholarship, there is evidence of only three accepting under-the-table payments.

“It’s like if I walked into my 7-year-old son’s bedroom and hit him with a haymaker,” Lott said.

“He would look up at me and say, ‘What did I do, daddy?’ What would I tell him? ‘You didn’t do anything, but I belted you because other kids in your classroom caused a disruption.’ He wouldn’t understand.

“This, I don’t understand.”