It has been nearly a month since the awful Mike Rice basketball hurling video was released, but the crazed ex-Rutgers Scarlett Knights‘ coach is still causing trouble. Indirectly, Rice is responsible for the NCAA‘s paranoia of coaches abusing players.
Brian Wardle has been the coach of the University of Wisconsin at Green Bay Phoenix for the last three years and did so with no complaints. While the team was not the best in the conference, they have gotten better each year that Wardle has been at the helm. In the past week two ex-Phoenix players and their families have been very open about the emotional abuse that they endured while playing basketball for coach the recently scrutinized coach. It’s awfully coincidental that these reports come out in such a timely fashion with the firing of Rice coming just two weeks ago.
I smell a rat on this one and I hope I am not the only with a handful of inquiries.
Although they are not as high praise as the Scarlett Knights program, the cloud over Wardle’s head is not going to shrink anytime soon. Walk-on Ryan Bross started this mess saying that the abuse by Wardle was so bad that he had to transfer out of the university, but Bross did not have any evidence nor did he report any physical abuse. Many are calling this the beginning of the end in terms of wussafying collegiate sports, however it’s deeper than that.
With the Rice saga serving as a backdrop, the opportunity to throw any coach you dislike is now available to even the most irrelevant players like Bross. I know one thing, Bob Knight and other old-school coaches are grinding their teeth.
