Rice Scandal?

[raiderdj]

Monday, May 24, 2004

Rice Coach Defends Student-Athlete hosting
Associated Press

HOUSTON -- Six former Rice University football players claim they were regularly taken to Houston strip clubs and offered alcohol while they were still high school recruits, television station KHOU reported Monday night.

One former player, Kevin Ford, said that while a recruit three years ago, football players who served as his student hosts took him and some other prospects to a strip club where alcohol was offered.

"It was like they had won a million dollars just because they could go and see a naked woman," Ford said. "When you're that young you're easily influenced by the wrong things."

Rice football coach Ken Hatfield and athletic director Bobby May told the station they had no knowledge of recruits going to strip clubs.

Hatfield said hosts and recruits must sign a document letting them know what they can't do during visitation.

"Before they go out, we want to say, 'Here's where you can go; here's where you can't go.' If he's not willing to sign it, I'm not willing to have him on my campus," Hatfield said earlier Monday, before the story was aired, at a Knight Commission meeting in Washington about reform in college athletics.

During the meeting, Hatfield also defended the practice of having players act as hosts when high school prospects make weekend visits.

"There's no doubt that a satisfied customer is your best salesman," said Hatfield, who asks his host players also to sign the form pledging to avoid certain behavior. "You've got to put them with your student-athlete if you want to know anything about them."

Rice is the nation's smallest NCAA Division I-A school with 2,800 students.

Ford said he left the school after being suspended for allegedly cheating on a test.

http://sports.espn.go.com/ncf/news/story?id=1808659

[Thor44]

I would be curious to hear what the other 5 have to say as well. Quotes from a kid who was suspended for "allegedly" cheating on a test, makes it sound like sour grapes to me.

[TechDawgFan]

From the Houston Chronicle today:


May 25, 2004, 1:49AM

Rice revamps recruits' rules

Behavior forms to be required of Hatfield's football prospects

By DAVID BARRON
Copyright 2004 Houston Chronicle


As a television station reported Monday night that Rice football players have accompanied high school prospects to Houston topless nightclubs, Rice coach Ken Hatfield told a panel on education reforms that future visitors will be asked to sign forms promising to avoid improper behavior during recruiting trips.

Hatfield, the president of the American Football Coaches Association, detailed the proposed conduct forms in an appearance before the Knight Commission in Washington, D.C.

"Before they go out, we want to say, 'Here's where you can go; here's where you can't go,' " Hatfield said, according to the Associated Press. "If he's not willing to sign it, I'm not willing to have him on my campus."

As Hatfield returned to Houston on Monday night, however, KHOU (Channel 11) aired a story quoting several former Rice players as saying it was common practice to escort underage high school football prospects to adult entertainment establishments during recruiting trips.

"They (the prospects) were pumped up about going to a strip club, because it was their first time going," Kevin Ford, a Rice football letterman in 2002, told the station. "It was something they wanted to do."

Hatfield was not available to comment on the Channel 11 report, and Rice athletic department officials referred questions to a university spokesman.



Taking precautions

Hatfield's comments in Washington came in response to questions by the Knight Commission about the recruiting scandal at the University of Colorado. A grand jury has been convened to hear testimony regarding allegations that Colorado players used sex, alcohol and drugs to lure recruits.


Rice athletic director Bobby May said the forms to which Hatfield referred were prompted by an NCAA task force on recruiting that convened in the wake of the Colorado allegations.

"One of the recommendations is to have a document that the prospective student-athlete and the student hosts would sign that would be pointed in their agreement to observe appropriate decorum," May said.

May said the form would "clearly outline the expectation for the behavior of the student-athlete and the prospect during the visit so there be no uncertainty about our expectations."

In their appearance before the Knight Commission, Hatfield and former Texas A&M coach R.C. Slocum defended the practice of having players act as hosts for recruits.

"There's no doubt that a satisfied customer is your best salesman," Hatfield said. "You've got to put them with your student-athlete if you want to know anything about them."

Slocum, now an adviser to Texas A&M's president, spoke against the idea of national standards for recruiting visits, saying they should be left to individual schools.

"I personally don't think this is a major problem," Slocum said. "We can't legislate to do away with all wrongdoing."



Old allegations

Monday's report by Channel 11 was not the first time that players from Rice and other local schools, including the University of Houston, have been tied to allegations regarding improper conduct during recruiting trips.


In February, as the Colorado scandal was unfolding, the president of a Denver company that employs strippers in Houston said his dancers had been hired by students at Rice and UH to perform at parties that might have been attended by student-athletes or prospective student-athletes.

Steve Lower of Hardbodies Entertainment Inc. said such parties were commonplace in Colorado and elsewhere around the nation. He said the parties took place off campus and that the dancers were paid by students.

[HogDawg]

Am I the only guy that finds it VERY INTERESTING that this ugly "porn" story didn't break until just a few hours AFTER the Rice board voted unanimously to remain in Div 1A athletics? That alone WREAKS of a "coverup".

HD

[Cal&Ken]

Obviously there is some merit to the story if they already have a plan in place to make sure it doesn't happen again. I am sure though that Rice and Colorado are not the only culprits for interesting recruiting trips. Hopefully this will be policed a little better in the future.