Gophers Win Laugher
November 5, 2009

The University of Minnesota Golden Gophers basketball team officially opened the 2009-2010 men’s varsity basketball season with an exhibition game against Minnesota Duluth (known outside the Twin Cities metro area as UMD) on November 5 at Williams Arena.

UMD would have done better to have dressed members of their Division II trophy-winning football and hockey teams and played the Gophers. Arena patrons then likely would have enjoyed some semblance of defense on the part of the Bulldogs. As it was, not only did the 14 UMD basketeers who saw action lack athletic ability, they also appeared unwilling to guard their opponents. The Gophers didn’t have to break a sweat in winning a 114-47 laugher. If Minnesota wants tougher competition for next year’s exhibition opener, athletic director Joel Maturi would be wise to schedule either UMC or UMM.

As usual, Lawrence Westbrook led all scorers with 19 points in 16 minutes of action. Devoe Joseph came off the bench to score 18 points, and Damian Johnson added 16. Johnson also had a double-double with 10 rebounds in 20 minutes of playing time. The utterly hopeless Bulldogs trailed the Gophers by 50-13 at halftime and 75-18 and 93-28 later on. Unfortunately, the game carried with it no provision for the mercy rule. UMD, so successful in hockey and football, will be lucky to escape the cellar of the Northern Sun Conference in basketball this season.

The announced crowd of 11,398 soon lost interest in the action on the newly-constructed arena floor and focused their attention toward the bench on a pair of Gophers who weren’t in action. At the end of the Minnesota bench, outfitted in neat dress shirts and ties and sitting smartly at attention were Royce White and Trevor Mbakwe, a pair of Twin Cities high school products, who may well be occupying those seats while similarly dressed for the rest of the season’s games.

White, Minnesota’s “Mr. Basketball,” ranked by Lindy’s Basketball as the No. 2 small forward to be recruited into Division I basketball in 2009, was suspended by coach Tubby Smith for shoplifting and attempting to beat up a mall cop. Mbakwe, meanwhile, has been charged with felony assault in Florida. Maturi has banned him from play until his case is resolved by authorities.

No matter how hard the athletic department at the University of Minnesota tries to avoid it, the basketball program has been enveloped in scandal since 1971 when booster and envelope company owner Harvey Mackay decided to revive Gopher basketball fortunes by handing out fistfuls of cash to recruits. In 1976, the NCAA put the program on probation and ordered the university to “sever relations” with Mackay, a somewhat difficult task since he was listed as a distinguished alumnus.

Scandal reared its ugly head again in January, 1985, when starting forward Mitchell Lee was charged with raping a female student on campus at Centennial Hall. A year later, he was acquitted and celebrated by having the outline of a champagne glass shaved into his hair. On January 23 of that year, Lee, Kevin Smith and George Williams were charged with rape in Madison, Wis. University president Kenneth Keller declared the team would have to forfeit its next game, and coach Jim Dutcher resigned in protest. Dutcher was replaced (on an interim basis) by assistant coach Jimmy Williams, the man who recruited the notorious Lee.

Williams was succeeded by Clem Haskins, a man perceived by university officials to have an immaculate record as a coach, father, church-goer, and humanitarian. Haskins was exposed as a fraud after an NCAA investigation that resulted in placing the basketball program on probation for four years and cut its scholarships, as well as visits by recruits, over the succeding three years. Haskins, athletic director Mark Dienhart, and vice president of athletics McKinley Boston were ultimately responsible for numerous incidents of academic fraud that took place during the Haskins regime. All three were fired. The NCAA ordered that team records from the 1993-1994 season through 1998-1999 be vacated. In effect, it was as if the Gophers’ 1998 NIT championship and 1997 Big Ten title and 1997 Final Four appearance never happened.

With the basketball program in shambles, it was up to new coach Dan Monson apply at least a shred of dignity, which he did, but unfortunately without winning results. Monson was succeeded by former Kentucky coach Smith, a man with a reputation for winning games while attracting quality recruits. But even his sterling character, Smith was not able to escape the dark cloud that seems to permeate Williams Arena. He was warned that White and Mbakwe represented a potential danger for the program but he signed them up anyway.

Around the state of Pennsylvania and elsewhere, backers of the Penn State football program are troubled by the fact that four current starters, Andrew Quarless, A.J. Wallace, Jared Odrick, and Navorro Bowman, are on the team because head coach Joe Paterno gave each second, and sometimes third, chances. At various times, members of this quartet were found to have been guilty of marijuana and alcohol abuse, disorderly conduct, academic failures, and various multiple offenses.

Paterno and Smith were regarded as paragons of virtue among college coaches. Now JoPa’s immaculate reputation is being questioned, even in State College, Pa. And here in Minneapolis, Tubby Smith has discovered that not even he can avoid the fog of scandal that never seem to want to leave University of Minnesota basketball.