A Rule Eligible for Review

With losses already to Iowa, North Carolina and Indiana, the Kentucky basketball season has not started as planned.

But even the losses haven’t been as big a distraction to the team or its avid fans as the situation surrounding Wildcat center Randolph Morris, a 6-foot-10 sophomore who has been declared ineligible by the NCAA.

Last summer, Morris, 19, his head filled with good words and lofty predictions of his imminent NBA greatness, declared himself eligible for the NBA draft.

That in itself is not what did him in, though. He made a couple of mistakes, it seems -- the biggest of which was probably letting the sports management agency SFX shepherd him through the process.

SFX helped Morris set up workouts with at least seven NBA teams and rent a gym in Chicago to work out for another tryout camp.

What SFX apparently didn’t tell Morris was what would happen if he didn’t get drafted. And Morris didn’t get drafted.

So, after not communicating with Kentucky for two months -- he never spoke with Coach Tubby Smith; he faxed him about his decision -- Morris called Kentucky and said he wanted to come back. And the Wildcats welcomed him even though Morris had been quoted on an NBA website as saying, “I don’t know if a year of college basketball helped me all that much basketball-wise,” which didn’t sound like a ringing endorsement of Smith’s coaching.

But last week the NCAA announced that although Morris hadn’t signed a contract with SFX, it seemed to be acting as his agent. For that, the NCAA said, Morris must miss this season and pay to a charity a little more than $7,000 in expenses he was deemed to have accepted.

He can come back next year with two years of NCAA eligibility left, but the Wildcats need a center now.

Kentucky is appealing the ruling. The school had suggested a nine-game penalty would have been sufficient. It pointed out that Morris completed his class work last spring and remained in good academic standing, something that doesn’t usually happen if a player is certain he won’t be back at school.

Morris acted immaturely. Not calling his coach? Not asking Kentucky compliance officials what he needed to do to test his NBA prospects while leaving himself eligible to come back to college? Letting his head get turned by the pretty words he heard from SFX? Thoughtless, silly, ill-considered.

Here’s the thing, though: NCAA rules allow college basketball players to make themselves eligible for the draft, even go through the draft and then come back to school if they don’t like the results.

But the rules prohibit the student-athlete from hiring an agent. Here’s where common sense would come in handy.

If the NCAA is going to allow student-athletes to investigate their NBA prospects, tell them it’s all right to go through the draft and suggest it’s wonderful for the student to come back to college if things don’t work out, then the NCAA should also realize that the athlete is going to run into agents and lawyers and management companies. The NCAA should see that the athlete is going to be navigating through unfamiliar territory and that a little help isn’t a bad thing.

Lynn Lashbrook, president of Sports Management Worldwide, a company that offers online courses for prospective agents, lays the blame in the Morris case mostly on SFX.

Lashbrook, who used to work for Jim Steiner, head of SFX’s football division, said, “The agent has a responsibility for protecting the welfare of the student-athlete. What if he returns to college? What if he doesn’t get drafted? You’re dealing with naive families. The agency is supposed to have a little maturity. But in the corporate agent world we all know the ethical compass isn’t very strong. I mean, you can’t buy a student-athlete popcorn without knowing all the rules.

“So now, with this kid, all we’ve got is finger pointing. Everybody says they didn’t know. The NCAA gets a bad rap sometimes. Let’s point some fingers at these agencies too.”

In an e-mail, an SFX media relations staff member said SFX was not allowed to comment at the request of Kentucky officials. Smith and Kentucky Athletic Director Mitch Barnhart did not return calls for comment.

The NCAA ruled that Morris’s activities constituted an “implicit” agreement with SFX. Kentucky is arguing that, without any evidence of a signed contract, Morris has been punished enough. A ruling on the appeal is expected early next week -- too late to get Morris into Kentucky’s game against Louisville this weekend.

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What Would You Do?

Here are the decisions coaches need to make all too often.

Texas El Paso senior forward Jason Williams, the Miners’ leading scorer, broke freshman teammate Stefon Jackson’s jaw with a punch last week during what Coach Doc Sadler called “a very competitive practice.”

According to news accounts, Jackson was guarding Williams in a four-on-four drill. After serving a one-game suspension in a game UTEP lost, Sadler announced Tuesday he was allowing Williams back on the team. Jackson needed surgery on his jaw and will miss at least the next six weeks.

“I’ve got to make a decision based on what is best for our basketball program,” Sadler said.

Meanwhile, at Arizona, senior guard Hassan Adams was issued a misdemeanor citation by Tucson police for disturbing the peace Sunday night. Police had come to break up a noisy party in the parking lot of Adams’ apartment complex. According to the police report, Adams became involved in an argument between a woman and another man. When police asked Adams to leave the scene, he refused.

Adams, from Westchester High, had already been disciplined by Coach Lute Olson for breaking an unspecified team rule during a loss at Houston last week. He is the Wildcats’ leading scorer (18.3) and second-leading rebounder (7.3) and is on the Wooden Award watch list.

Olson has been out of town recruiting, according to Arizona, and no decision has been made on whether Adams will play for Arizona at Utah on Saturday. Adams practiced with the team Monday and Tuesday.

Do you let them play?

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Pac-10 Is Losing the Ratings Game

Sent from the offices of the Missouri Valley Conference, the latest RPI computer conference rankings.

The RPI is one component the NCAA tournament committee uses in picking at-large teams, and the Missouri Valley is proud to be ranked No. 5 right now behind only the Big 10, the Big East, the Atlantic Coast and the Southeastern conferences. So where is the Pacific 10 Conference? At No. 10 -- behind even the Colonial, Atlantic 10 and Western Athletic conferences.

The most recent bad loss for a Pac-10 team was Arizona State’s 75-71 beating by Utah Valley State.

“We cannot beat a junior high team with the defense we played today,” Sun Devil Coach Rob Evans said.

Utah Valley State, still making the transition to full-time Division I status, is coached by Dick Hunsaker. Hunsaker had been head coach at Ball State, where he took a team to the Sweet 16, and at Utah, where he spent a year as acting head coach when Rick Majerus took a leave of absence.

Although it’s early and the RPI ratings will change dramatically (Duke may stay No. 1 but it’s unlikely Northern Illinois will remain No. 2 come tournament time), it is telling to look at where the Pac-10 schools are right now.

The highest-ranked team is No. 29 Washington. Conference favorite Arizona is down at No. 97 and Stanford, picked to finish second, is at No. 298 (losses to Montana and UC Davis will do that). UCLA is at No. 31 and USC is No. 163.

Where the conference rankings may matter is when it comes time to dole out at-large NCAA bids. A conference rated No. 10 probably won’t get four, five, six at-large invitations.