>>Question on the Maine forfeits:  assuming the Black Bears aren't banned
>>outright from the 1994 NC$$ tournament (and you would think that if they
>>were, the NC$$ would have announced that along with the 21 forfeits), how
>>will the forfeited games be treated when the tournament rankings are drawn
>>up?
>
>This exact question was asked of Rick Comley (chair of the NCAA selection
> committee) at the blue line lunch today.  He said that The comittee would be
> required to look at maine's record as if the forfeits never happened.  He
> didn't seem
>to like the idea, but said thats how they would be mandated to handle it.
 
The idea is that the committee is selecting TEAMS and not RECORDS. Has
the quality of the team that Maine puts on the ice changed because they
had to forfeit? Did suddenly all of their players get real bad, as bad
as a 5-26-1 team would be? No. They did lose Jeff Tory for the season,
but Patrice is back.  If half of the squad was kicked out, leaving just
a shell of the team that went 16-12-4, then you would have a case for
not considering Maine's "on ice" record. Actually, the NCAA has another
rule for this, and they can leave teams out of the tournament just
because of the "availability of student-athletes".
 
The flip side, of course, is that it appears that Maine is getting away
with cheating. I mean, if you break NCAA rules, and the NCAA says you
have to forfeit those games, it seems contradictory then for the NCAA
to come back and say they will select teams without any concern for the
forfeits.
 
I don't know what "the answer" is, if there even is one. What a mess.
 
Keith