BCS Not Playing by NCAA Rules

A report this week that alleges tutors at Tennessee may have done schoolwork for football players raises interesting questions about the ambiguous relationship between the NCAA and the bowl championship series.

Should the allegations prove true, the NCAA could wallop Tennessee with major sanctions but could not strip the Volunteers of their 1998 national title.

Why?

The NCAA has jurisdiction over all championships except football, which is governed by the BCS.

“I’m not going to comment on any issues involving allegations,” NCAA spokesman Wally Renfro said this week. “But as to whether the NCAA has any area of authority over the BCS champion, I don’t believe the NCAA does.”

In 1997, the NCAA stripped the UCLA softball team of its 1995 national title as part of sanctions levied against the school.

The NCAA also controls the NCAA basketball tournament and, should the University of Minnesota receive major sanctions for alleged tutor-student violations, the NCAA could, and probably would, strip the school of NCAA tournament money.

If Tennessee is punished, however, the Fiesta Bowl will probably not get its $12 million back.

Welcome to the murky world of major college football, which is controlled by conference commissioners and television.

The BCS was formed two years ago as a mechanism to pair the top two college teams for a “mythical” national title game.

The organization operates independent of the NCAA and comprises commissioners from the six major conferences: Pacific 10, Big Ten, Big 12, Big East, Atlantic Coast, Southeastern, plus a representative from Notre Dame.

The BCS is led by Roy Kramer, commissioner of the SEC, of which Tennessee is a member.

Again, worst-case scenario, would the head of the SEC lead a BCS charge to strip Tennessee of its title?

Charles Bloom, spokesman for the BCS and an employee of the SEC, says it’s too early to speculate about what may happen to Tennessee.

But he does not think Kramer has a conflict of interest because all BCS board members have an equal vote.

“A lot of people don’t know what’s going to happen,” Bloom said. “It’s not one of those things that gets discussed: What if a previous champion has to forfeit games? What happens to the BCS trophy? I don’t think that has been discussed.”

Will it be now?

“I don’t know,” Bloom said.

The BCS national title trophy is awarded by voting members of the USA Today/ESPN coaches’ poll.

Hey, isn’t that the same ESPN that broke this alleged Tennessee scandal?

There sure are a lot of fingers in this pie.

Tennessee also won the Associated Press national title, which is independent of the NCAA.

Would the AP strip a sanctioned school of its crown?

“We would not withdraw that championship,” Terry Taylor, sports editor of the Associated Press, said Wednesday. “We have always stuck hard and fast, they are rewarded for what they do on the field.”

In fact, Taylor said, at least one AP voter in the past has been stripped of his vote for refusing to rank a school that was on probation.

Another hypothetical: If there is no chance of having your national title stripped in football for committing major violations, what is the motivation to stop tutors from writing papers.

“I won’t deny that it raises interesting questions,” Taylor said.

Renfro, though, says the NCAA can still be a major deterrent in football.

“There are other penalties available beyond the vacating of a championship that might very well be persuasive to the institution that violates the rules,” Renfro said.

Stay tuned.

COOL BREES

The best thing about Drew Brees’ Heisman Trophy campaign is that he does not have one.

No key chains touting the junior Purdue quarterback, no mood rings, train whistles or weekly junk-mail deliveries.

Not that there’s anything wrong with that. Two years ago, Washington State sent a single leaf to Heisman voters to promote quarterback Ryan Leaf’s campaign. Very clever. Given what we know now of Leaf’s personality, however, Washington State should have mailed teething rings.

But Purdue has a different approach, sort of akin to the “Seinfeld” episode in which George tries to pitch a show to NBC based on “nothing.”

Last summer, Purdue sent out a mailer to writers that stated, in essence, there would be no more mailers. Brees and his family did not want the word “Heisman” attached to any of his literature.

The hedge bet in the Boilermaker boiler room was that Brees’ chances would sink or swim based on Purdue’s record.

To date, it has been a stellar campaign.

With Purdue off to a 4-0 start, which includes a nationally televised victory over Notre Dame, Brees has positioned himself nicely as a Heisman front-runner, inching ahead of Wisconsin’s Ron Dayne after Dayne was held without a second-half rushing yard in last week’s loss to Michigan.

The best part: Jim Vruggink, Purdue sports information director, hasn’t had to lick one stamp.

“I was always offended when I got [Heisman] junk in the mail,” Vruggink, a former sportswriter, said.

This is the way Brees wanted it: Judge him based on performance.

“You can’t sit there and say, ‘Vote for me for Heisman,’ ” Brees said this week from West Lafayette, Ind. “I’m just trying to go out, have fun, play football, and everything will take of itself. If we’re winning, and successful, I’ll have a chance to win the Heisman, that’s the way it is.”

Brees’ campaign will be decided with a brutal stretch of Big Ten games, starting Saturday against No. 4 Michigan in Ann Arbor.

After that, No. 11 Purdue plays at No. 12 Ohio State, then hosts No. 14 Michigan State and No. 2 Penn State in consecutive weekends.

No team in America faces a tougher gantlet.

“We’ve never encountered anything like this before,” Brees said.

The Big Ten could say the same of Brees, a castoff from Austin, Texas, who has turned the cloud-of-dust conference on its head with Joe Tiller’s West Coast offense.

“I guess we’re bringing the WAC to the Big Ten and making it the Big Ten,” Brees says.

Last year, as a sophomore, Brees set conference records for touchdown passes (39), passing yards (3,983), total offense (4,176), completions (361) and attempts (569).

He set an NCAA record with 83 passes in a loss to Wisconsin, prompting Penn State Coach Joe Paterno to quip: “I’ve coached teams that didn’t throw 83 passes all year.”

WHAT PRICE VICTORY? SIX GRAND

East Carolina is 4-0 and ranked for the first time since 1996 after Saturday’s upset of Miami, but victory did not come cheap.

The bill, in fact, should be hitting East Carolina Athletic Director Mike Hamrick’s desk this week.

Because of stadium damage caused by Hurricane Floyd, East Carolina played its home game at Raleigh’s Carter-Finley Stadium on the campus of North Carolina State.

After the emotional win, East Carolina fans stormed the field and tore down North Carolina State’s goal posts.

Brinkley Wagstaff, North Carolina State’s assistant athletic director for facilities, said the price for two new goal posts is $4,500--a total of $6,000 after shipping charges.

Wagstaff says it will take his staff about four hours to put in the new posts.

“After everything East Carolina has been through, goal posts are no problem,” Wagstaff said.

North Carolina State can get some post-post revenge on Nov. 20 when the Wolfpack plays at . . . East Carolina.

COMING HOME

East Carolina’s win was a huge boost for Coach Steve Logan and his program, but the elation ended Monday when the team returned to washed-out Greenville, N.C., for the first time since Floyd ripped through town Sept. 18.

Logan heard that much of the student housing had been flooded, but what he saw shocked him.

“It’s not water, it’s sewage,” he said. “I don’t think what’s there can be salvaged.”

Most of the team lives off campus, so only 16 players were permanently displaced by the hurricane. They will receive aid from the NCAA’s “Needy Student Athlete Fund.”

HURRY-UP OFFENSE

Tennessee Coach Phil Fulmer said Wednesday he could not comment on the specifics of the investigation of his program but did say: “If something’s not just right, we’ll certainly take care of that. Because we want to do it right, and I believe we have.”

Recruiter Rick: First-year Washington Coach Rick Neuheisel’s exuberance in the aftermath of Saturday’s 31-24 win over Colorado has already paid off. After Neuheisel shook his fist at a group of Washington recruits attending the game and screamed “Get on the boat!” Zach Tuiasosopo, brother of Husky quarterback Marcus, grabbed an oar. That night, he made an oral commitment to attend the school.