Cal finds NCAA rules have flaws
Mike Kellar is right.
What deterrent is there for using an ineligible player in a football game if the offending team is not charged with a loss or have its playoff hopes dashed?
The head football coach at California University asked that question after the NCAA selection committee allowed Bowie State a spot in the Division II playoffs, despite using an ineligible player – its starting quarterback – for half the season.
Bowie State’s inclusion came at the expense of Cal, which would have been the next team in had Bowie State not made it.
Bowie State did not receive as severe a punishment as in the past, when the NCAA charged a loss for each game an ineligible player participated. The NCAA changed its policy for those situations two years ago. It’s called nullification, but I’ll get into that a little later.
Kellar said he spends a lot of time and makes a strong effort to make sure his players are eligible. Anyone who has been a coach, be it high school or college, knows that task is more than just asking a player how he is performing in school.
And he makes a valid point when he said:
“I’ll just never understand how a team could be 9-1 and have played an ineligible player (and still get into the postseason). I don’t know what message that sends. I just really believed the NCAA would step in and do the right thing.”
Heading into the final game of the season, Cal was ranked eighth in the Super Regional 1 rankings with a 7-3 record. Bowie State was second at 9-0. The top seven make the playoffs. Bowie State lost, 17-14, to Winston-Salem State in the Central Intercollegiate Athletic Association championship game but the rest of the teams ranked ahead of Cal won. Cal defeated Lock Haven for its fourth win in a row to move to 8-3 but remained in third place in the PSAC West Division behind Slippery Rock and Indiana.
The obvious solutiom for Cal’s playoff dilemma before the Bowie State situation came to light was win one more game. The loss that hurt the most came against Bloomsburg, 20-13, in Week 2. The Vulcans led 13-0 in the second quarter but allowed 20 consecutive points. Had the Vulcans won that game, they would be in the playoffs.
That doesn’t erase the fact Bowie State did not receive much of a punishment through nullification. The Bulldogs are still in the playoffs and, though maybe seeded lower, still can play for a Division II title. Cal, or whatever team that would have been included had the NCAA’s old rules been in place, won’t have that opportunity.
The NCAA implemented nullification as a sanction for using an ineligible player because it did not want to punish the many for the misstep of the few, or in this case, the one. It works this way: for any game an ineligible player participates, that team has its winning percentage reduced by a certain percentage – in football, it’s .023, but it varies from sport to sport – and that is taken into consideration when the pairings committee decides playoff participants. How much does it affect the selection process? The process is not normally discussed by the committee members.
Last year, the CIAA found a women’s basketball team, Livingstone, used an ineligible player and the Blue Bears lost in the conference semifinals and did not make the postseason tournament after being the No. 1-rated team in its region.
The NCAA prefers the nullification process over forfeits because it believes the penalty should not punish all for the digression of a player. What the NCAA fails to realize is that this infraction – the use of ineligible player – affected the production of the players around him.
Keeping Bowie State in the football playoffs was a mistake, and might affect how intensely some schools keep track of eligibility. Maybe Kellar pointed out the biggest problem here when he said:
“I don’t see what punishment (Bowie State) got for doing that.”
Assistant sports editor Joe Tuscano can be reached at jtuscano@observer-reporter.com.