What does a "public reprimand" actually do? Nothing? Oh, ok

By now, you have all seen the video of Steve Alford and Jonathon Tavernari getting into it after New Mexico beat BYU on Saturday.

You have also likely seen the video of Alford and Tavernari apologizing to each other after the game.



And if that's not enough, you surely saw the video or read somewhere about Alford's appearance on ESPN's First Take and his apology to BYU head coach Dave Rose. Apparently, that wasn't enough for the MWC, as they decided to further punish Alford ... by publicly reprimanding him.

From the MWC:

University of New Mexico Men's Basketball Head Coach Steve Alford has been issued a public reprimand for his unduly provocative language toward an opposing student-athlete following the February 27, 2010 New Mexico at BYU men's basketball contest. Coach Alford's action was in violation of MWC Sportsmanship Rule 4.4.3.

The Mountain West Conference will have no further comment regarding this case. The provisions of the MWC Sportsmanship Policy can be found in Rule 4 of the MWC Handbook - which can be accessed via the www.TheMWC.com Web site.

That's it. That's their entire punishment.

Fair warning to all you MWC coaches. Do not violate Sportsmanship Rule 4.4.3., or you risk facing a two paragraph press release that ... well, what exactly does it do?

Lets Alford, and the nation, know that he made a mistake?

I think we all realized that from the get go. I spend my fair share of time on the internet, and I have yet to come across someone defending Alford's actions. Hell, he didn't even defend his actions. Once cooler heads prevailed, he and Tavernari apologized to each other. Alford apologized to Rose. Its pretty obvious that all parties, including the blogging and sport-watching public, involved realize both people, particularly Alford, were in the wrong.

And we didn't need a public reprimand to tell us that.

Watch this video. The kid in this video does something dumb, namely trying to jump into a pool with his eyes shut. Now, whether or not this kid's mom yells at him, I think he is going to learn pretty quickly that it is not a smart idea to try and do any physical activity with your eyes closed. Because, you know, you could end up with some scraped knees.

The same goes for Alford. I think that, as the video of him calling an opposing player an "a--hole" went viral, Alford learned pretty quickly that it is, in fact, a bad idea to have a verbal altercation with an opponent, especially when cameras are around. He doesn't need the MWC "publicly reprimanding" him when there are plenty of blogs out there to do the job for them.

Just like that kid doesn't need his mom yelling at him about running with his eyes open when the scabs on his knees teach him just fine.

(Side Note: This isn't the first time this season that we have had incidents with coaches yelling at people. Remember when Roy Williams threw a fan out of a game against Presbyterian? What about when Coach Cal was caught on camera telling Reginald Delk that "he'll beat your ass after the game.")

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Steve Alford channeled his inner Bobby Knight

New Mexico picked up what was likely their biggest win of all-time as they went into the Marriott Center and knocked off BYU.

For those that are unaware, BYU is one of the most difficult places to play on the road, regardless of conference affiliation. Prior to New Mexico's win on Saturday, the Cougars had not lost in Provo in 21 games.

Not only did New Mexico win, they clinched at least a share of the MWC crown and earned the top spot in next week's conference tournament. But despite the impressive victory by the Lobos, it seems that everyone is talking about an incident in the postgame handshake than the actual win.

Darington Hobson saved the game with a block on Saturday afternoon.
(photo credit: B/R)

It started with just under a minute left. Jonathon Tavernari of BYU was defending New Mexico's Darington Hobson when New Mexico head coach Steve Alford called a timeout. What happened next is a bit unclear, but the general consensus seems to be that Tavernari played defense a little bit to physically for a little bit too long, and Hobson gave him a nice little elbow to the ribs for his trouble. Tavernari reacted and had to be held back by multiple teammates.

Officials checked the monitor but didn't give Hobson a technical.

That brings us to the post-game handshake. According to multiple reports, Alford tried to congratulate Tavernari on an excellent career at BYU, but Tavernari didn't take too kindly too the words. What happened next was caught on tape.



A couple things about this incident. For starters, the only thing you can clearly make out from either party is Alford saying "I'm gonna tell you you're a good player and you act like that? You're an a**hole."

Then, he had this to say after the game to Andy Katz:

"I was telling him he had a phenomenal year and career at BYU," Alford said of the senior. "He was obviously upset and had words for me. But he came into the locker room afterwards and apologized. It was a class act. He's a great kid and it was senior day so I felt for him. I understand what happened. He's one of my favorites in the league."

Confrontation aside, New Mexico has to be considered a contender for a #2 seed and, dare I say, a threat to reach the Final Four?

Seriously.

The Lobos have now swept BYU, beat Pac-10 champ Cal, knocked off Texas A&M on a neutral court in Houston, and beat both Texas Tech and Dayton when those two teams were peaking. They have won 13 straight conference games after dropping their first two to San Diego State and UNLV.

The Lobos have made it very clear that they are not afraid of playing anyone this season.

Maybe the country should take note.

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More Gary Parrish bashing

For those who remember, back in February I wrote a scathing harmless critique of a post Gary Parrish made on his blog "The Thoughts" (he even responded to me).

Here comes another one.

Before anyone jumps down my throat, I have a great deal of respect for Parrish. I believe my exact words were

I like Gary Parrish. In fact, he is probably the college basketball writer that I read the most. Why? Because he and I have very similar viewpoints on most things college hoops.

Faux-hawk be damned, Gary Parrish can write.
(photo credit: CBSSports)

But as in any industry, when you are one of the best, people expect the best from you.

About a month ago, Parrish had a column discussing how pointless it is for juniors with no chance of getting drafted to declare for the draft. Today, he reiterated that point with a post on his blog about BYU's Jonathon Tavernari titled "Tavernari is out, but why was he ever in?"

I've touched on this twice before (here and here), but we'll go for round three.

Before I get into the meat of this post, let me drop some quick knowledge for those that don't know. The way that eligibility and the NBA Draft works right now is that anyone is allowed to declare for the NBA Draft so long as they are 19 years old and one year removed from high school (the rules get a bit more complicated for international players and fifth year high school seniors, but that doesn't matter here). They can withdraw from the draft once and keep their college eligibility intact so long as that player pulls their name out of the draft before the deadline (this year it is June 15th) and he does not sign with an agent, although they are allowed to contact an agent for guidance and advice.

So if you are a junior in college, you have not yet entered your name into the draft, and you have any kind of aspirations of playing in the NBA one day, you should be entering your name in the NBA Draft.

I repeat, every junior in the country with NBA aspirations should be entering their name in the draft.

Why?

Its simple really. Even if there is a "0.00 percent" chance for that player to get drafted this year, he still has an opportunity to get direct feedback from people directly associated with the NBA. Maybe you don't get invited to a workout by any NBA teams, or maybe you get told flat out that you are not good enough to get drafted, but I guarantee that at the very least they will get some kind of critique on what they need to improve on to up their draft stock for next season from someone who is not afraid of hurting the kid's feelings.

This is why the NBA instituted the rule allowing players to "test the waters".

Let's use Tavernari as an example. He is a 6'6" wing player that can score (15.7 ppg), but he relies heavily on his perimeter shot to get his points (38% from three on 6.8 attempts per game, with just 1.7 FT's attempted per). He is not overly athletic and needs significant improvement on his all-around game if he wants a shot at being drafted in 2010.

Jonathon Tavernari has withdrawn his name from draft consideration.
(photo credit: Examiner)

I know this. Parrish knows this. BYU coach Dave Rose knows this. Hell, Tavernari probably knows this.

Even if Tavernari doesn't get invited to any workouts, I guarantee that NBA scouts know who he is and what he can do, especially when he has played most of his career with Trent Plaisted and Lee Cummard. In a worst case scenario, I'm willing to wager all that is holy that Tavernari can get a scout on the phone, and that scout can tell him exactly what he needs to improve individually to get more looks next season.

That is the important part. Individually. What he needs to refine in his game to make himself a better NBA prospect. This is the time (the summer) when basketball players get a chance to develop their game - to make themselves a better shooter, a better ball-handler, a better defender, more athletic. I fail to see any negatives for the players when they get, at the very least, someone telling them what they need to do to make their game more compatible with the NBA style.

So whether or not Tavernari actually believed he had a shot at making an NBA roster come October (he didn't) is irrelevant. Given the way the rules are structured, he played the game to perfection, and hopefully got some useful advice along the way.

On another note, I have absolutely zero qualms with kids like Jeremy Wise from Southern Miss or David Huertas of Ole Miss leaving school to sign with an agent and make money playing basketball (well, one qualm - it hurts the college game I love so dearly). And to be fair, Parrish agrees with me here. If a kid decides he no longer wants to go to school and instead wants to start making more than the boosters pay money playing basketball, who am I to tell him not to? College kids do it all the time, and I bet that Wise and Huertas will be making more than most college dropouts in this economy anyway.

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