Has the gag order been lifted?

[Burnsbros23]

If he paid a recruits mom 30 grand to move here were about to be hammered by the NCAA.

We won’t have to pay Ollie tho.

 

[superjohn]

Herbst and Benedict are in a tough spot because their job is to generate money and armed robbery was their only path to the loot. But that doesn't mean they aren't the bad guys. They negotiated the contract and didn't have the courage to own up to their mistakes. They are both completely gutless and their actions are a stain not just on the program but the school.

If people on this board could step out from their bubble for just a second, they'd see that they themselves are the real victims of Herbst and Benedict's incompetence. I get the fact that you don't think Ollie deserved his buyout, trust me I do. But the reason there is a hierarchy in place is to prevent situations like this where the customer gets bent over. Administrators are supposed to be held accountable for the failings of the people they hire. The fact that some of you pretend to not understand how our economy works because you can't get past a grudge is sad.

"But Ollie signed the contract. In the real world, when you sign a contract, there are consequences for not complying."

This is not the real world and the NCAA is not a real mediator. You all know this and choose to ignore it because it's inconvenient. The NCAA runs a business, meaning they profit from ticket and merchandise sales, not compliance. Again, this isn't hard stuff. Kevin Ollie signed the contract he did because he put people in the seats. The fact that the school proceeded to self-report violations once it became clear that business was lagging to get out of the contract is something you'd see in an Al Pacino film. This is not normal. Even by the standards of college sports, this is not normal. It's blatant corruption and a violation of worker rights on the most fundamental level. That this injustice is systematic and not necessarily pertinent to the particulars of this case does not matter.

When an NCAA investigation is in the best financial interest of a school, you need to blow the model up. Rationalizing this was one thing when everyone's interests aligned - players got paid under the table, everyone profited. Now that these shenanigans have compromised the integrity of the school/coach agreement, I am drawing a firm line in the sand. This practice - irrespective of how you feel about Ollie - is wrong and it's obvious.

This is arguably the most tone deaf
nonsensical post I've seen here. It's like reading a 12 year old kid trying to put together a coherent post with a dictionary in front of him. Pro tip, being incessantly long-winded doesn't make what you're saying profound, it has the opposite effect.

It takes about 20 words. Our former coach was tasked with winning games and not breaking rules. He didn't win games and he's a cheat. Contract was breached, goodbye and good luck.

 

[UConnNick]

If he paid a recruits mom 30 grand to move here were about to be hammered by the NCAA.

We won’t have to pay Ollie tho.

Yes, we won't have to pay him, but at what point does this crazy train go totally off the rails and the NCAA hits the entire AD with "lack of institutional control" yet again? Mark Emmert is drooling somewhere over that prospect. By self-reporting this stuff in their zeal to walk away from the stupid contract they gave Ollie and save 10.6 million, it's conceivable they may have sunk their own ship.

What's even more beyond stupid is you can give jobs to parents of recruits and it's not an NCAA violation. Duke did it with Duhon's mom and in another case they hired both parents of a recruit as professors. All Ollie had to do was get this woman a job at UConn and pay her the $30k for her job.

I'd also be willing to bet nobody in our AD ever shared this particular tidbit of info with Coach Hurley.

Suzy and Benedict run our AD like Moe, Larry and Curley would have.

 

[Burnsbros23]

I dont Know all the details but I know The NCAA changed the rule where u can’t hire parents as director of opps, player development, only as full time assistant. I dont Know if that rule extends into all academic fields I think It may.

 

[Chief00]

Yes, portraying Miller as the villain is laughable. Whether the school self-reported or a third party caused the NCAA to begin its investigation, Miller was sure to become a person of interest to the NCAA either way. As such, wouldn't anybody act in their own self interest? Screw Ollie and UConn at that point. He's out to save himself.

Some here portray him as an unlikeable person. That may be, but didn't we have a recruit who decommitted because he got fired? It now appears that Ollie may have grown tired of Miller telling him to quit violating NCAA rules. Who knows, but Miller did what he did to save his own hide. He was going to have to talk to the NCAA at some point. It's not like the AD, Calhoun and Miller all got together and orchestrated a smear campaign against Ollie.

Maybe saving himself makes him a weasel, but he's no rat.

He’s a rat. You are not obligated to offer heresy rumors in testimony. He will be suing the school next. Calhoun has a mess on his hands now. You never want someone, no one else will hire because if you fire them - they don’t move on with another job - they do this and UConn will be next - with Glen suing them for losing his job - due to being a whistle blower. Now the public knows why UConn offered him placeholder jobs which he refused.

 

[auggie22]

welp I'm not sure how he gets out of this one

"Ollie got a close personal friend named Derek Hamilton to train some of the players off campus in 2015-16. Several players participated in after hours, on-campus workouts with Hamilton as well as off-campus workouts. Three players traveled to Atlanta to train with Hamilton and the players were fed, transported and housed for free — all considered NCAA violations. The letter said one of the parents of a player who went to Atlanta even called Ollie to ask if the trip was legal."

This one ... is bad. The others seem Ricky tack, but not this one. A Kentucky and Syracuse level shenanigan.

 

[tcf15]

I feel like the more I read about Glen Miller's testimony the more I cringe - there's a lot of hearsay in there.

 

[UofCT]

Make it stop

 

[Chief00]

Since it's public, can you comment if the $30K allegation has any merit?

I don’t know if the $30k is true. I do know that was not the only question about that relationship.
In concept, Chief believes KO’s problem was he could not be NBA road trip at UConn. You do a bunch of stuff wrong or stupid and move on to the next city and repeat the process. Read Pat Ewing’s ex wife’s book. In a college job you have to live with your mistakes and burned relationships that come back to bite.
As for Miller, you see how no one offered him anything like happened to DK or Chill. One wonders if JC was concerned about GM and frankly UConn - and did this SJU to give GM something positive to focus on rather than destroying his former boss and school. Not that JC wanted KO to stay in job but Glen was clearly on a pure negative, unhealthy and vengeful path. He’s a rat.
For all the failure in his KO relationship I don’t see him telling Glen - hey go to the NCAA and let fly with any rumor you ever heard or imagined. I heard he was concerned about Glen’s mental and emotional health. Sure JC was upset Glen got fired but Glen was the guy who sung like a bird to the NCAA. It’s on him.

 

[djct1999]

I feel like the more I read about Glen Miller's testimony the more I cringe - there's a lot of hearsay in there.

I agree, but there is enough there to atleast put a permanent gag order on the blaze strategy. We should never have to hear about that again. Ever.

 

[freescooter]

NCAA Hearing officer: Coach your team had illegal off season practices.
Ollie: Did you see my team play?
NCAA: No
Ollie: I didn’t think so. If you did you’d wonder if they even had LEGAL practices!

 

[Chief00]

I agree, but there is enough there to atleast put a permanent gag order on the blaze strategy. We should never have to hear about that again. Ever.

Your timeline is wrong - this stuff happened in 2015/2016. Blaze started in June 2017. The architect of Blaze got himself a real D1 job just a couple months ago.

 

[Chief00]

Chief, I implore you, please be careful. We can't risk having you violate the gag order. Too much is at stake here and you're too important a figure to be reckless. We all appreciate the position that you're currently in and understand the restrictions on what you can and cannot provide us.

Thanks - good advice. But, Chief doesn’t like rats and that can get the best of me - even though I thought KO should move on.

 

[junglehusky]

That's essentially the point I'm trying to make here.

I hold zero illusions about college sports, and frankly don't care either (with obvious exceptions like Mich State, Baylor, Penn State, etc.)

My point here is that Herbst and UConn went about this in a sleazy way, with the help of Miller who ratted out Ollie over some frivolous bs. Which both scenarios ultimately would have never come to light or been an issue had KO been winning.

The notion that some people here think it's proper business conduct is a joke.

Oh no, something vaguely sleazy and frivolous happened and a former employee "ratted" (translation: told the truth). Heavens to Betsy.

 

[Milo65]

Snitches get stitches.

Yes, but ain’t payback a bitch!

 

[junglehusky]

I don’t have evidence beyond my eyes - but after Ollie won and the relationship went to crap... to allow Miller to be a rat makes it pretty clear how angry he was.

I’m not even defending Ollie. He sucked and I was on the Ollie sucks train early. I remember getting shouted down by posters pathetically giving him passes because of his divorce.

Doesn’t change the fact these violations are a joke. I’m not going to root for the inept leadership to avoid taking responsibility on bogus technicalities. I’m sure as hell not going to root for them when they enabled a rat to sing to the NCAA and he came up with ‘yeah, I don’t know’.

As for jumping to conclusions... we can go with Miller acted alone and ratted out his boss’ hand picked successor... which would put Calhoun’s no show job that pays hundreds of thousands a year at risk.

I’m sure that it. Miller just casually ratted out UConn and hangs out with Calhoun all day at St Joe’s.

It wasn’t obvious at all when Calhoun sits courtside looming at home games all the while having no relationship with the head coach.

Firing a head coach for NCAA violations = "avoid taking responsibility."

Riiiiiiight.

On another note, shout out to all the rats out there. Stay strong, don't listen to the haters. Here are some interesting rat facts I found on the internet:

• Rats take care of injured and sick rats in their group.
• Without companionship rats tend to become lonely and depressed.
• Rats have excellent memories. Once they learn a navigation route, they won’t forget it.
• Rats make happy “laughter” sounds when they play.
• Rats succumb to peer-pressure, just like humans. Brown rats are prone to disregard personal experiences in order to copy the behaviour of their peers. The urge to conform is so strong that they will even choose to eat unpalatable food if they are in the company of other rats who are eating it.
• Although very curious animals, rats are also shy, and prefer to run away than confront a potential threat.Rats are extremely clean animals, spending several hours every day grooming themselves and their group members. They are less likely than cats or dogs to catch and transmit parasites and viruses.

• A rat can go longer than a camel without having a drink of water.
• Rats’ tails help them to balance, communicate and regulate their body temperature.
• The rat is the first of the twelve animals of the Chinese zodiac. People born in this year are thought to possess characteristics which are associated with rats, namely: creativity, intelligence, honesty, ambition and generosity.
• Rats are recognised as the vehicle of Lord Ganesh in Indian tradition. They are worshipped at the Karni Devi Temple, where priests and pilgrims will feed them grain and milk.

 

[8893]

Geesh, why crap on Calhoun with some vague allegation? That doesn't somehow rehabilitate what KO did.

I looked at the first three of these and thought "wow, this is pretty weak" but as it went on I cringed a bit. These aren't "technical" violations they are violations. If they knew this was out there Kevin's representation should have settled and gotten out of dodge.

I am being vague on purpose; I don't want to crap on Calhoun but Miller worked for both of them and turned choirboy on one. I don't like sanctimony, especially when coupled with double-standards.

Ollie has no one to blame but himself. Fishy is right: he half-assed his job and half-assed some NCAA compliance issues. And yes, his contract is different than Calhoun's. I'm not happy that he put us in this position.

I just hate the karma of this. I hate the optics. I hate everything about it because it's my school and no one--no one--comes out of this looking good. The Miller testimony makes me queasy, but the school used him for the specific purpose to get out of the $10M. He had his reasons and the admin had theirs. And Calhoun is uncomfortably a part of all of it.

I'm really just sick about it. I know it's stupid, but a lot of life is about distraction and for most of my adult years UConn hoops has been a very happy distraction for me, in good times and in bad. I was ready to move on and looking forward to the Hurley era, and now this is going to be mentioned in every single broadcast for at least the next season. And I hate that Hurley is going to have to field questions about it, too.

If the Mets were doing better I might be a little less down about it, but right now I hate it all.

 

[Paesano]

The number of people calling Glen Miller a rat or a snitch is hilarious. I am absolutely 100% certain that all of you Johnny Tightlips would be completely loyal to the bosses who fired you and basically blamed you for their own incompetence.

Internet mobsters everywhere.

Agreed! I am loyal to my alma mater. I am loyal to the men who built the basketball programs because they helped grow my alma mater. That is it.

If we want to be all ethical, KO doesn't deserve a damn thing because he stopped doing his job. He wasn't just bad at it. He was negligent. If we want to be technically rigid by the contract, KO doesn't deserve a damn thing because he violated the terms of his contract. Pretty damn simple.

 

[huskyrob1]

If you think the Atlanta trip is a big violation - you should spend some time around a major college basketball program.

Maybe we can go back and see who thought the penalty for Kirk King was fair.

No it's not a big violation, free hotels, free food, and free plane tickets happen all the time. Lol

 

[uconnphil2016]

No it's not a big violation, free hotels, free food, and free plane tickets happen all the time. Lol

The thing is I’m sure they do. Read the piece on Ole Miss and Miss State football, I believe it’s by Stephen Godfrey. Outlines huge payments to kids heading to below average sec programs

 

[junglehusky]

The number of people calling Glen Miller a rat or a snitch is hilarious. I am absolutely 100% certain that all of you Johnny Tightlips would be completely loyal to the bosses who fired you and basically blamed you for their own incompetence.

Internet mobsters everywhere.

 

[Mokum]

No mention of dollar oyster night in West Hartford Center?

Dollar oyster night?! If this is true, I am moving back to West Hartford, where I grew up.

 

[UConn990411]

If he paid a recruits mom 30 grand to move here were about to be hammered by the NCAA.

We won’t have to pay Ollie tho.

Considering the other investigations going on, this is probably the best time possible for these violations to come out.

 

[whaler11]

The number of people calling Glen Miller a rat or a snitch is hilarious. I am absolutely 100% certain that all of you Johnny Tightlips would be completely loyal to the bosses who fired you and basically blamed you for their own incompetence.

Internet mobsters everywhere.

Yeah I’m sure you run to HR everytime you see someone use their computer for personal use or spend $15 over the per diem on a business trip.

Miller does have a reason for being a rat. The people who sanctioned it look worse.

The Jacobs story is even funnier now. It wasn’t leaked by the ‘athletic department’, it was leaked by the rat who was sanctioned by the athletic department.

I need to be careful, but I don’t believe Jim was the one who changed after Kevin had success. Kevin changed.

Jim changed enough to send a rat to the NCAA.

Calhoun did not attend many games the last two years.

Wow there is a guy who looks just like him.

I feel like the more I read about Glen Miller's testimony the more I cringe - there's a lot of hearsay in there.

What stuff Glen Miller’s wife told him AFTER he got fired might not be 100% accurate? How about if Miller says ‘you know’ four times a sentence.

I hate everything about it because it's my school and no one--no one--comes out of this looking good. The Miller testimony makes me queasy, but the school used him for the specific purpose to get out of the $10M. He had his reasons and the admin had theirs. And Calhoun is uncomfortably a part of all of it.

They ran the athletic department into a black hole and are so desperate to avoid paying a buyout an employee (who works full time elsewhere) sanctioned his employee at his day job to rat out the program. And what the rat came up with is nonsensical hearsay. So what came of it? “Yeah, I don’t know”.

It makes sense to be mad at Ollie but cheering on the incompetent clowns to get off on a technicality... watch your back Danny.

Firing a head coach for NCAA violations = "avoid taking responsibility."

Riiiiiiight.

Come on - you are smarter than this. That’s all this is. Management signed a bad deal with the wrong guy. So in order to save their own rears they are working technicalities they would never so much as notice if they went to the Sweet 16.

Root for the technicalities if you like but don’t pretend that isn’t what happened here.

No it's not a big violation, free hotels, free food, and free plane tickets happen all the time. Lol

I know you aren’t being sarcastic which is a scary disconnect from planet Earth.

Many schools systematically cover up rape and assault. 6 figure amounts are passed from shoe companies, boosters and coaches to players, families and hanger ons.

Other than stuff that reads like a fever dream Miller had after getting fired the violations are so pedestrian as to be comical for 1,300 pages.

 

[Tenspro2002]

A fanbase of complete frauds. Rooting for Susan Herbst to save a few dollars - LOL.

Rooting for a disgraced ex-coach to save a few dollars - LOL.

Say what you will about Herbst, is it better for the program to have 10MM or for KO to have 10MM? This should be extremely straightforward for any UConn fan.

 

[whaler11]

Rooting for a disgraced ex-coach to save a few dollars - LOL.

Say what you will about Herbst, is it better for the program to have 10MM or for KO to have 10MM? This should be extremely straightforward for any UConn fan.

It’s fine to root for the school to keep the money. Just be honest about it and don’t pretend the ‘violations’ aren’t a joke.

Herbst destroyed the athletic department and people give her a free pass. I’m baffled by it - but in time people will come around - same as all the other scrubs she hired and employed - Warde, PP, Diaco, Ollie... someday many will come to their senses.

 

[RipCity]

Glen Miller vs Kevin Ollie: 2 will enter, both will suck

 

[Mokum]

I am being vague on purpose; I don't want to crap on Calhoun but Miller worked for both of them and turned choirboy on one. I don't like sanctimony, especially when coupled with double-standards.

Ollie has no one to blame but himself. Fishy is right: he half-assed his job and half-assed some NCAA compliance issues. And yes, his contract is different than Calhoun's. I'm not happy that he put us in this position.

I just hate the karma of this. I hate the optics. I hate everything about it because it's my school and no one--no one--comes out of this looking good. The Miller testimony makes me queasy, but the school used him for the specific purpose to get out of the $10M. He had his reasons and the admin had theirs. And Calhoun is uncomfortably a part of all of it.

I'm really just sick about it. I know it's stupid, but a lot of life is about distraction and for most of my adult years UConn hoops has been a very happy distraction for me, in good times and in bad. I was ready to move on and looking forward to the Hurley era, and now this is going to be mentioned in every single broadcast for at least the next season. And I hate that Hurley is going to have to field questions about it, too.

If the Mets were doing better I might be a little less down about it, but right now I hate it all.

Me too man, this is my major distraction from the struggles of life. I hope all this passes quick and we can get back to having fun with Uconn playing great basketball. That being said, I am not optimistic. I have a feeling this all around bad situation will drag on for a long time. I am already getting sick of it.But I do think great BB is on the horizen.

 

[Paesano]

This is bad.

Quick! Give an out of state student's mom $30k so we can use the UNC defense!!!

Wait, I will send my kid to UConn if they give my wife $30k!

 

[uconnphil2016]

So who was the kid whose name was blotted out in the alleged 30k payment?