NevadaFan

Opening with an “honestly who cares” followed by lots of butthurt.

Has a decision been made on Horton?

Fake news? Right. It was a huge ruse to discredit poor Tarkanian. Like I said. It’s all there an interesting as hell to read. The articles on Bill Morris, are fascinating as hell too.

That... and to win basketball games.

Tark cheated. That’s a certainty. Tark justifies cheating by arguing that other schools like UCLA did it but only small programs like LBSU, Vegas, and Fresno were vilified by the NCAA. I think to some degree I agree with this. Power programs have more money and power to fight the NCAA.

This is true. It also true that these kids also just happened to be some of the best basketball players in the country. To help him win basketball games and in turn, generate a lot of money for a lot of people including himself.

That and if you’re a righty throwing high 80s you’re a dime a dozen. Baseball is pay for play. It’s a business at the JUCO level.

See Stanford too. I will say this, if you get offered there you can’t have a C on your transcripts and you have to complete a number of AP classes including advanced sciences and math.

I think if Tark wanted to help these kids he would have graduated a decent percentage. I’m not saying it’s all on Tark but his graduation rate was abominable.

Great point. I’m just picking my favorite Tark stories. And while I think there is some validity to what you’re saying, the crux of all the articles is this: Tark was a good man. But he took kids that couldn’t get into other programs to win. Good reading.

I think after reading these stories I agree some of what the NCAA did was wrong. I also learned a ton about Tark and Vegas. I also think that Tark cheated, bent rules and cut corners to get kids into Vegas that would have ZERO chance of getting into school now.

And one of my favorites: “So let's start with 1985 and a recruit named Clifford Allen, 6-foot-10 out of Carson, Calif. Everyone wanted him, at least until he was busted for robbery his senior year and sent to the El Paso de Robles Youth Correctional Facility. Then it was pretty much just UNLV recruiting Clifford Allen. Tarkanian was undeterred by the imprisonment. He was the king of second chances; in part because growing up in Pasadena, without a father, as the son of an immigrant with a strange name, as a smart, but disinterested student, he himself needed a few. He saw the possibilities in anyone. Plus Allen could really play. He saw those possibilities, too. So he went to the correctional facility and talked to Clifford on the phone through the glass. It was just like the movies. It worked. Allen earned a GED behind bars and was headed to play for the Rebels upon his release. That you've likely never heard of Clifford Allen, that he never scored a point in college basketball, let alone the NBA, and the fact he was later sentenced to 45-to-life for murder in Florida, would normally be the climax of the story.”

“Lloyd Daniels attended five high schools in three states, never graduated, never earned an equivalency diploma, and entered Mount San Antonio Junior College in Walnut, Calif., this past semester with a reported third-grade reading level. Furthering his prep legacy was this statement: "I ain't allergic to no school. I just don't want to go." This time next year the same Lloyd Daniels may be enrolled at the University of Nevada Las Vegas and eligible to play basketball for the Runnin' Rebels.”

I got nothing? Does your internet not work? There are dozens of articles on the bizarre situation that was Vegas basketball during the Tark era. ”Eventually, the NCAA came to investigate (though Long Beach State boosters and Tarkanian himself would contend big programs such as UCLA got a pass on NCAA scrutiny). “In brief, I fired him,” Horn recalled in the oral history. “He had wanted to stay. Las Vegas had been wooing him. … I said, ‘Jerry, you’re not staying here. The violations that we have found show clearly that you violated the NCAA rules and I’m not going to have a member of the coaching staff that does that.’ “And he looked at me with those innocent eyes. I’ll never forget this, he said, ‘Dr. Horn, I haven’t violated any NCAA rules.’ He even blinked his eyes innocently. I said, ‘No way.’ ” There are some downright interesting stories on Tark.

He was ran out of town because his cheating started to embarrass your admin and biggest boosters.