Jim Tressel led the Ohio State football team to one of the most successful stretches in school history from 2001 to 2010. That decade of national prominence would quickly be forgotten outside of Columbus, Ohio, however, as the former Buckeyes coach would leave the school amidst multiple NCAA violations.
Regardless, Ohio State has decided to induct Tressel into their Athletics Hall of Fame later this year; a move that is certain to spark controversy in the college football landscape.
If it were the College Football Hall of Fame honoring Tressel, I would take serious exception to this. A head coach forced to leave one of the most recognizable universities in the college football has no place in the sport’s Hall of Fame.
If Ohio State wants to honor him, though, it should be free to do so. After all, the school is the one stuck with the decision if it backfires, not that it likely will.
Like it or not, circumventing the rules has always been a fabric of collegiate athletics, and Tressel’s actions are far from the most egregious that we have witnessed. Whether it was USC turning a blind eye to boosters funding an NFL lifestyle for their star players in the early 2000s (and assuredly long before that), Kentucky basketball coach John Calipari leaving both of his prior two schools under a cloud of NCAA violations or North Carolina committing nearly two decades of academic fraud, there have been much worse transgressions in the world of college sports.
Continue Reading: Should Jim Tressel be in OSU’s Hall of Fame?
