<a href="http://www.accessatlanta.com/ajc/sports/uga/0502/0508sec.html" target="_blank">Two more Southeastern Conference football programs could be in hot water with the NCAA.</a>

This time Tennessee with alleged payoffs to Tee Martin and LSU with alleged academic fraud involving football players.

I'm curious to hear the thoughts of SEC fans. It's not just at one school, but is touching schools throughout the conference. Is this really necessary in order to keep your teams competitive?

Let me post this on our situation...then I'll move to my reasonings Lucy.

Now, I can make this statement concerning ours. From the looks of things, it looks like ours is really not much of anything....basically, if you remember the 80s drama "Dallas"...here's "Dallas II: a true story"

For background, UA (Arkansas) reported to the NCAA that players had been overpaid while working for J&H Trucking in Dallas, TX...run by Ted Harrod, a huge HOG fan and booster. However, the players and school were unaware that they were being overpaid (and sent money back to J&H), and the amount overpaid was somehwere over $200 in a 3 month span per player...which roughly translates to $67.00 a month, or not even $1 an hour over.

Harrod is going through a nasty divorce with his wife, Karey Harrod. Karey, who had an affair and now is dating the president (and working for) of the RIVAL trucking company to J&H in Dallas, is claiming she has do***ents proving that "100 dollar handshakes" were given to football players and such. However, when the NCAA asked for these do***ents, she refused. She finally handed in one...and the result? The do***ent was forged...and check records at J&H proved it. So now, Karey Harrod is in this divorce, plus the fact that she's in trouble under Texas state law for a) forgery, and b) releasing any do***ent intended to be incriminatory towards the opposing party in a divorce. What's worse, the UA was drug into this by her accusations and such.

Anyways, giving SEC fans information on what's been going on.

Reasoning? I'd say pride mostly Lucy.

As you probably know, the South takes a beating from the media and others with harsh stereotypes about every single southern man and woman being a poor, ignorant redneck who lives in a trailer. We're considered inferior in everything to everybody outside of the South. The only true exception is athletics, especially in football. I remember going to a barber in Tuscaloosa (where the Univ. of Alabama is) and the barber noted "We might be considered the worst in everything humanly possible...but the Crimson Tide can still beat the hell out of those northern teams!" People in the South take their sports more seriously, because southerners are very proud people, and it is very hard for any true southerner to swallow the consistent attacks given by northerners. Football and other sports are considered the only cure in shutting anti-southern rhetoric. Therefore, it's my opinion that SEC teams get in trouble a lot mainly because southern pride is trying to make sure, no matter what, that the south will be superior in SOMETHING in the eyes of the national media and most Americans.

Just my opinion.

Thanks for the responses, c_t_h! The Arkansas situation sounds like a case of a very bitter woman getting in over her head playing with the big boys and I do hope the NCAA realizes that.

As far as the reasoning, I think there is something to the age-old South vs. North thing. However, I think the SEC is definitely recognized as a football conference on the national scene by now. In fact a great deal of the SEC/ACC rivalry comes from the SEC having the national rep in football & the ACC having the same in hoops, and both conferences desperately wanting to increase their rep in the other sport. Having lived in Big 10 country, I do recall people talking about SEC football teams with respect. Hopefully enough parity has come that such jockeying for position will not be as necessary, and collegiate programs and BOOSTERS will not feel the need to break or bend the rules as much in the future.

BTW, congrats on the Arkansas mod job!

Thank you Lucy <img border="0" title="" alt="[Wink]" src="wink.gif" />

Yeah, the SEC is recognized as the power conference in football; they're just trying to keep it that way I guess...school by school (at least the big boys are it seems). What I find funny is that the two school hammered by the NCAA, Alabama and Kentucky, paid their players, yet one team went 7-5, the other 2-9. Seems like bad business deals to me.

More to come on the Tennessee issue. According to someone on PigPen, the Memphis Commercial Appeal will run a story tomorrow on yet another Tennessee recruit who was supposedly paid to go to Tennessee. If that rumor is true, I will link it and re-post. (The Commercial Appeal link can be found on the Arkansas board here).