Just a clarification.  When Plattsburgh had its 1987 title taken away,
Oswego did NOT become the champion.  The title was declared vacant for
that season.  I believe the games between Plattsburgh and Oswego for
the title *were* declared as 1-0 forfeit wins for Oswego, however.
 
Likewise, I believe that with Wisconsin losing its 2nd place finish in
1992, the runnerup slot that year is also declared vacant.  I also
believe that since Wisconsin's opponents have been given the option of
accepting or rejecting forfeits that season, those tourney opponents
Wisconsin defeated would receive 1-0 forfeit wins if accepted, but their
finish in the tourney does not change.  These situations are always
noted in the record books and so there is no need to question why a
team appeared to have won a round but did not move on.  It is just one
of those things.
 
I would be interested in hearing of any of Wisconsin's opponents who
accepted the forfeits so I can make the necessary changes to the
composite for that season (currently in the archives as 9192COMP
SCHEDULE).  Thanks.
 
Along the lines of this discussion, Wayne has told me that it was
already decided that with Maine's forfeits in the early part of the
1991-92 season due to the retroactive ineligiblity of Cal Ingraham,
since Maine drops below UNH in the standings, UNH has been named the
regular season champion for that season.  That has not been posted
here before to the best of my knowledge.  Maine is still the HE tourney
champion for that season since they would have qualified for the
tourney anyway and Ingraham was not ineligible during the playoffs,
and that makes perfect sense to me.  I am sure some will question this
since a lower finish would affected the playoff pairings for that
season, but that is the way it was done and I agree with it.
 
One other comment.  Jeff Billman suggested:
>A better idea, and one I'm surprised the NCAA hasn't done in light of
>football & basketball, is to suspend teams from future playoffs and/or
>holiday tourneys.  This would penalize teams more for their infractions.
>Hopefully, appeal systems could be built in where a team that commits a
>violation in 1994 won't be penalized 'til the 1995-96 season.
 
I am absolutely and completely 100% against this practice.  It is not
fair for the players who came along after the fact to be punished for
something that happened earlier.  Institute sanctions against the
school if you must, force them to forfeit games in which the team that
broke rules played, but don't forget that college athletics are played
primarily for the players.  Often, it seems to me that when these decisions
are made, the ones hurt most are the innocent players who are just
trying to get an education and play sports, and they don't deserve it.
---                                                                 ---
Mike Machnik                                          [log in to unmask]
Cabletron Systems, Inc.                                  *HMM* 11/13/93
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