Rutgers’ Richie Parker moment

Right now the Rutgers football program is taking a crash course in a lesson that Seton Hall basketball learned very painfully in the winter of 1995.

Back then, Seton Hall coach George Blaney accepted a letter of intent by Manhattan star Richie Parker, who had been charged with (and subsequently pleaded guilty to) a sex offense. When Parker’s guilty plea came out, public pressure crescendoed to the point where Seton Hall had no choice but to release Parker, who wound up at LIU.

I remember the uproar well. As editor-in-chief of The Setonian, which broke the story (not bad for a weekly), I was interviewed by NBC, The New York Times, Editor & Publisher and several other media outlets (including one local camera crew that dropped by our office on a Thursday evening after I had ingested roughly five pounders of Milwaukee’s Best).

Now it’s Rutgers football coach Greg Schiano who will have to answer questions about Plainfield High School’s Reggie Dixon. Unlike Seton Hall, Schiano released Dixon before the public knew what had happened (ESPN was about to break the story). Also unlike the Seton Hall situation, Dixon already had been convicted of aggravated sexual assault when he signed his letter. And according to several media reports, Schiano had been made aware of this before signing Dixon (see today’s Star-Ledger: starledgerfollowup)

This raises some hard philosophical questions.
–Is it the coach’s responsibility to be pro-active in vetting recruits’ backgrounds with great scrutiny, and where does one draw the line?
–Should a young person who has been convicted and paid his penalty under the law be denied an athletic scholarship?
–How much does public knowledge of the incident in question play a part in the decision? How much should it?

I wonder what George Blaney would say to Greg Schiano right now.

Congratulations to former Franklin High School standout Mike Tyree, who has signed a National Letter of Intent to play Division I basketball at Stony Brook University after spending the past two years starring at Seward Community College in Kansas.

This past season, Tyree averaged 17.8 points per game and connected on a school-record total of 100 3-pointers, which ranked him sixth nationally among community colleges. The 5-foot-11 guard also shot 80.7 percent from the free-throw line and was named to the Region VI all-tournament team.

Tyree, who was a first-team All-Area selection after leading Franklin to the Somerset County Tournament final in 2005, also was recruited by Bradley, Eastern Illinois, Long Island, Manhattan, San Diego and Boise State.


About Jerry Carino

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17 Responses to Rutgers’ Richie Parker moment

  1. Anonymous says:

    I think football gets more of a pass becasue of the nature of the game. How else would Miami get any recruits?
    An athletic scholarship is a privilege, not a right. If debt has been paid to society for a crime, it should be up to the school administration to hire a coach that recruits based on standards set by the school. The school however, needs to realize that this will impact the performance of the team.


  2. Anonymous says:

    How come it is OK for the RU womens basketball program to take a player with a recent criminal pass but this is not OK?

  3. Anonymous says:

    Schiano should have to publicly reply as to why he recruited and ultimately accepted an LOI from a convicted sex criminal.

    Of course this is also coming from a school that amid major budget cuts cut 100’s classes and fired 100’s of professors but increased the football budget and gave the coach a raise. RU really needs to get their priorities straight. Are they a school or a half-way house for criminal athletes?

    RU is an embarrassment as a state university.

  4. Jerry Carino says:

    It’s OK for the women’s basketball program because it’s not going to get on ESPN — very few people give a hoot.

    Rutgers is now a national name in football. This extra scrutiny is the price you pay for soaking the spotlight in big-time sports.

    It’s the difference between the president committing adultery and some congressman doing it.

    Double standard? Yes. That’s the way it is.

    Also: It’s doubtful Schiano will reply publicly. His cryptic comment about “new information” being revealed is the best you’re going to get.

    Here’s probably what the “new information” was: IT’S GOING TO BE ON ESPN IN TWO HOURS!

  5. Anonymous says:

    Once Schiano leaves, and he will leave, then RU will fall back into obscurity. They were the oddity of college football. While they will always be odd, very soon no one will care anymore. Once word gets out that sex offenders are recruited and encouraged to go to RU I’m sure any passing interest someone has in them will soon turn to potential students running the other way as fast as they can.

  6. Anonymous says:


    Laughable statements.
    You’re either delusional, dumb, deaf, bitter or blind if you think any of that is going to happen.
    RU is here to stay, son. Deal with it.

  7. the joker says:

    Nice job getting “Milwaukee’s Best” into a blog.

    This is why you’re a professional.

  8. Anonymous says:

    Seton Hall penis envy about RU football since that is what dominates this state–certainly capitvates them. 1989 is just that, 1989. Noone cares.

    And yet another swipe at RU, typical. I bet you were waiting for something, anything.

    In this case, whatever Schiano did or didn’t know, the bottom line is that he on his own released Dixon after the mother of the girl who was involved here (step sister) went to the press.

    Schiano didn’t need public pressure to do it. It was done.

    You might want to have mentioned that RU didn’t take a top Florida back in Easterling b/c of some issues.

    Football has 85 scholarships. Basketball 13.

    Nice try at the swipe.

    How’s that blue carpet treatment going for Mike Davis? God how pathetic does little ol’ Seton Hall sound.

  9. Anonymous says:

    Wow, one minor bowl that no one saw because it wasn’t televised and now you ‘dominate’?! Pretty high opinion of yourself there for a school seen as an athletic joke! Schiano is recruiting known sex offenders, that should bother you. However, is doesn’t because you are just that desperate to try to win. Selling your soul to the devil will come back to bite you.

    Sorry, no envy of anthing having to do with RU. It’s laughable that you even think that.

  10. Jerry Carino says:

    Let’s not turn this into a debate about the health of the RU football program, which is obviously in excellent condition now and for the forseeable future.

    It is true that Schiano stopped recruiting a top back from Florida (a much higher-rated prospect than Dixon) after a sex offense issue in the player’s past became known.

    That makes this situation all the more puzzling.

    But to espouse that Schiano coincidentally saw the light regarding Reggie Dixon an hour before ESPN went on air about it is disingenuous.

    Anyway, the purpose of this blog entry is not to bash Schiano, who wound up between a rock and a hard place. It’s to shine light on an issue that college coaches encounter more regularly than the general public realizes.

    If you don’t think the weighing of public pressure/scrutiny plays a part in this process, then you have the IQ of a goalpost.

  11. Anonymous says:

    I am sure if you had a daughter or sister at RU, your thoughts would be quite different….

  12. Anonymous says:

    OJ IS INNOCENT! HE WAs Framed by Detective Mark Foreman!!

  13. Anonymous says:

    I can’t stop laughing after reading that RU football “dominates the state.” You think anyone outside of Middlesex County and the rt. 18 corridor care about RU football? After being a laughingstock in sports across the board for, what, a century? Enjoy your moderate success. What does Seton Hall have to do with anything, except the Blaney-Schiano comparison. I went to Princeton.

  14. Anonymous says:

    the point is that comparing Schiano to the seton hall situation with Parker is not the same–not even close…

    whatever people here think of RU football (again penis envy), keep in mind seton hall is a million times smaller and less significant in the public eye than that…and this is after 2 yrs of winning football…imagine what will happen as they continue, which it will, certainly this year…

    and ESPN/ABC sure loves RU…have you see the ratings…so does the Empire State…

    you’ll never see in your life the Empire State blue…unless it was for the Knicks…

  15. Jerry Carino says:

    Well, Seton Hall and Parker were significant enough for every major New York television network and newspaper to show up on campus for the story. I know, because I talked to all of them.

    This was one year removed from the Carlesimo era, when everything Seton Hall did was big news.

    How soon we forget…

  16. bac2therac says:

    yes I love the SHU fans who post and eat this stuff up. Yes they really understand the success of Rutgers football. Face it folks, RU is on the upswing. I know its tough to admit but dont go kicking and screaming like babies now.

  17. Anonymous says:

    You and scarletrat remember to keep your composure, too, when the PSU job opens up and Greg heads west.