Gophers Jumping Through Hoops Trying To Dodge The Obvious

If the helpful office manager at the University of Minnesota really did write more than 400 pieces of class work for current and former Golden Gophers basketball players, she didn’t stop there.

She wrote everybody’s column today, too.

Technically, we had to do all the typing ourselves, so we’ll still be eligible to work the NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament opener today between the Gophers and Gonzaga at KeyArena. Any UM players who put their names on ghost-written work, however, may not catch the same break.

But never mind those term papers and take-home tests. Who wrote the scouting report?

If it was Jan Gangelhoff, you really have to like the Zags’ chances this afternoon.

Wow. March Madness meets Mata Hari.

As of Wednesday morning, Minnesota became the NCAA’s latest school for scandal. The Gophers basketball program, coach Clem Haskins and some red-faced administrators were rocked by a package of stories in the St. Paul Pioneer Press in which Gangelhoff, a former office manager in the athletic department’s academic counseling unit, confessed to doing class work for players from 1993 to 1998. Four of those players are supposed to suit up against Gonzaga today, but the school has launched a panicky investigation and, if it’s deemed appropriate, could declare them ineligible immediately.

The Big Dance just became The Big Dunce.

And for the rest of America - if not for Planet Zag - the Bulldogs just became afterthoughts, or asterisks.

Clem, you got some ‘splainin’ to do.

“I’d like to turn the page,” Minnesota’s veteran coach said wearily at his press conference Wednesday, “and talk about basketball. Quit with that and ask a basketball question.”

Uh, sure. Clem, why do you think your BASKETBALL players were apparently so eager to have someone else do their school work so they could remain eligible to play BASKETBALL, and why was the BASKETBALL program the only UM sport whose academics counselor was an athletics employee not supervised by the university’s counseling department? And did the BASKETBALL coach, as Gangelhoff charges, pay her $3,000 in cash to improperly tutor BASKETBALL players?

Are those basketball questions? Or do we have to ask about defending the 3-point shot?

If they aren’t basketball questions, then your prominently displayed statement that “It is more important to me and my staff to develop a total young man than just a basketball player,” needs to be pulled from the basketball media guide.

Fair enough?

Speaking of fairness, there seem to be some issues on that front, too.

That renowned journalism ombudsman, Minnesota Gov. Jesse “The Body” Ventura, body-slammed the Pioneer Press for its timing in running the story. Hypothetically, we assume that come the next election, Gov. Body would be in favor of having the newspaper sit on a report uncovering campaign fraud by his opponent until after the polls close.

Back on planet Earth, meanwhile, there were subtle signs that UM was starting to give Gangelhoff the Monica treatment. School vice president McKinley Boston was quoted questioning her credibility - never mind that four former players interviewed by the newspaper backed up her charges. Considering Boston’s on the NCAA committee that just put together this misbegotten tournament bracket, we shall not defer to him on matters of credibility.

And, of course, there is the issue of presumed innocence.

“We don’t declare people ineligible just based on an allegation,” said senior associate athletic director Jeff Schemmel. “We have to discover (information) on our own. And we haven’t had access to the actual source of the story, so it’s very problematic for us.

“Whatever decision we make will be questioned.”

Yes it will, but it won’t be questioned as pointedly as UM’s decision a few years ago to put basketball’s academic counselor in Clem’s back pocket.

If the school can substantiate any hanky-panky between now and tipoff, then the implicated players don’t play. There is no question. It’s the right thing.

But frankly, the Zags won’t take the court for tipoff nagged by doubts whether Kevin Clark and Miles Tarver really wrote their own term papers.

They were happy with the draw they received on Sunday because Minnesota is very much a beatable team as constituted, and they’re not looking for any additional favors. Indeed, coach Dan Monson wonders if these scandalous revelations may hurt his cause more than help.

“This is the first time I’ve heard of it,” Monson said when briefed on the allegations, “but I do know many teams, when they hit adversity it brings them closer together. It loosens them up and refocuses them.”

And with every notebook and microphone jockey mining for dirt, it won’t be hard for the Gophers to get on their us-against-the-world faces. “Anytime you have adversity, it pulls you together,” Haskins acknowledged. “If you have character and class, you pull together.”

Hey, we’re not touching that one.

Nor will any last-minute suspensions change GU’s approach.

“We had a similar thing with Brad Millard (the 7-foot-3 giant from Saint Mary’s) in our league tournament,” Monson said. “Will he play against you, or won’t he? We didn’t spend 10 minutes talking about that situation. It was something we couldn’t control. It’s like we keep telling them - we need to concentrate on ourselves, because if we play well we’ll have success.

“Even though it says `Gonzaga’ on our jerseys, our kids haven’t played a game this year that they didn’t feel beforehand they shouldn’t win - or after the game that they shouldn’t have won.”

Suddenly, though, this has become a very different kind of game, fraught not only with the grandeur of the Big Dance but the ethical knots of the Big Dunce. It would make a good topic for a term paper.

Know anybody who could write one?