Turns out, Sean Kowal isn't playing college basketball this season

Yesterday, we wrote this piece on the waivers that transfers receive that allow them to avoid the mandatory redshirt year when going from one Division I institution to another. One of those waivers can be granted when a player has graduated from their first school with eligibility left, allowing them to play immediately at a different program if they enroll in a graduate course that isn't offered at the school they graduated from.

In that post, we talked at length about Sean Kowal, praising him for using the aforementioned rule to his advantage and doing so, most importantly, in the spirit of the rule. Instead of leaving his previous school on bad terms with the team -- the way Eniel Polynice reportedly left Ole Miss to enroll at Seton Hall -- Kowal left with the intention of enrolling at a school that offered a Theology Master's degree so he could one day teach religion and coach high school basketball without having to shell out the money to pay for his education.

We praised him because he was a true student-athlete. Because he was using his basketball skills and god-given height to make himself a better applicant for a career he wanted to pursue.

It appears as if Sean Kowal's college basketball career is done.
(photo credit: Chicago Now)

But we spoke too soon.

Why?

Because it is mid-September, and Kowal still hasn't found a landing place.

Today, Andy Katz broke the news that Kowal has not actually enrolled in school. When we first wrote about Sean Kowal back in July, it was because Northern Illinois was not releasing him from his scholarship. NIU head coach Ricardo Patton believed that Kowal had been tampered with, that a school had contacted him about transferring before Kowal had officially received his release. It didn't help matters that Kowal was admittedly less than truthful in his initial attempt to receive a release.

The reason that Kowal is not currently enrolled anywhere -- it seems like the St. Louis native was headed to play for Rick Majerus and the Billikens -- is that the NCAA started to sniff around his case. St. Louis had a scholarship open, but they decided -- and rightfully so -- that it wasn't worth the headache of an NCAA investigation for what amounted to a one-year player, even if that one-year player was a 6'11" center that averaged 10.5 ppg and 6.4 rpg in the MAC last season.

I don't mean to be callous, because I really do feel for Kowal. He got himself caught up in the web of NCAA red tape when all he was trying to do was get his graduate degree paid for. But I believe my point from yesterday still stands. The NCAA's rule is that if you transfer from one D-I school to another, you have to sit out a season. They have the power to waive that penalty, but they aren't required too.

Kowal can deflect the blame all he wants, and he probably does have a point. NIU didn't have to drag their feet through the process of granting him his release. The NCAA didn't have to investigate this situation. But if Kowal had been completely honest in the first place, NIU likely wouldn't have had an issue with his decision to leave.

(In the initial Katz article, he wrote "Kowal said he later admitted that he wasn't as forthright about his intentions." In that same article, Katz later wrote "Northern Illinois athletic director Jeff Compher said Wednesday that the Huskies didn't have all the information from Kowal. Once it found out it was about a master's degree that NIU didn't have, it could resolve the matter quickly.")

There appears to be little doubt that Kowal is getting screwed here, and I certainly do feel bad for the kid. And while NIU definitely gets a good amount of the blame, Kowal himself is the one that initially complicated the situation. If he is truthful, then NIU isn't miffed about having a valuable piece taken from them. If NIU isn't miffed about the situation and allows Kowal to transfer, does it get any attention from me, or, more importantly, ESPN? And if this situation didn't make headlines, does the NCAA suspect tampering? Do they go poking around in Kowal's business? Does he become a toxic addition to a basketball team?

And let's be honest -- Kowal had options. He had an opportunity to play professionally for a team in Holland. Couldn't he have spent a year -- or a few years -- playing pro ball and saving up the money to pay for his education? That's what most of us average Joe's and Jane's do, right? We graduate college, work for a couple of years, and then head off to pursue a graduate degree. Am I wrong?

Like I said, I really do feel bad for Kowal. This was a golden opportunity for the young man that he never saw come to fruition. Not only does he lose his chance for a year of graduate school to be paid for, he loses his senior season of college basketball.

That sucks. Trust me. I know. I had my senior season taken away from me four games in. To say the least, its not a good feeling.

And while I can sit and bitch and complain about how I got a raw deal with the way my collegiate career ended, the bottom line is that I brought it on myself.

Just like Kowal. He may very well be getting the short end of the stick, but he's not blameless here.

He knew the rules.

And not all rules were made to be broken.