Rutgers Coach Never Completed Degree

Rutgers Coach Never Completed Degree - A report by the Web site Deadspin on Friday suggested that Jordan did not earn an undergraduate degree

Rutgers initially issued a statement that did not directly address whether Jordan had graduated. It instead noted that he was inducted into the Rutgers Hall of Distinguished Alumni in 2004 and that he had been part of the Rutgers “family” since before 1977.

“His athletic skills and leadership and his professional accomplishments have been a source of pride for Rutgers for more than three decades,” the statement said.

Later Friday, the university said it was “in error” when it reported that Jordan had earned a degree from Rutgers. The university said neither it nor the N.C.A.A. requires a head coach to hold a bachelor’s degree.

However, recent athletic department job postings, including one this week for an assistant basketball coach, list a bachelor’s degree as a requirement.

“Rutgers sought Eddie for the head coach position as a target-of-opportunity hire based on his remarkable public career,” Rutgers’s second statement said.

The episode is the latest in a sequence of embarrassing events for the university and its athletic department in the past month and a half. Jordan, who was introduced as the Scarlet Knights’ basketball coach on April 23, was hired to help restore the program’s reputation after his predecessor, Mike Rice, was fired following the release of a video in April showing him berating his players with homophobic slurs, throwing basketballs at them and pushing and kicking them during practice. Jordan’s professionalism and deep ties to the university were among the attributes mentioned by university officials when he was hired. (see HERE)

The furor surrounding the video of Rice led to the resignation of the athletic director, Tim Pernetti, as well as other officials, and the university faced widespread criticism for choosing to suspend Rice rather than fire him after learning of the video last year.

Rutgers appears poised to move forward with Jordan’s appointment. “We are excited to have him as our men’s basketball coach, and we look forward to many winning seasons,” it said.

A dozen years ago, Notre Dame terminated its newly hired football coach, George O’Leary, after he admitted falsifying parts of his résumé, including his claim that he had a master’s degree in education from New York University. O’Leary had been on the job for five days before the falsifications came to light.

A key difference is that Rutgers would presumably have had far better access to the records of Jordan, who has been honored repeatedly by the university for helping to lead it to its only Final Four appearance, in 1976. Jordan went on to play in the N.B.A., winning a championship with the Lakers, and was a head coach in the league for nine years.

at Rutgers 36 years ago when he was a star player, despite previous statements that he had. Deadspin reported that the Rutgers registrar’s office denied that Jordan had a degree from the university, which contradicts the biography on the university’s Web site, which says that he “earned All-America honors as a senior in 1977 before earning a degree in health and physical education.”

Source : www.nytimes.com

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