We have ourselves a good old fashioned NCAA bribery scandal brewing, involving Celtics assistant coach Jerome Allen.
As the old saying, you can never run away from a good-old fashioned NCAA bribery scandal.
Our latest journey to scandal island comes thanks to the Boston Celtics, where assistant coach Jerome Allen is now being investigated for allegedly taking bribes while he was the head coach at Penn.
According to Sports Illustrated, Allen, and two other people not named in the indictment, allegedly took money from Miami businessman Philip Esformes. In the indictment, it is reported that Esformes spent more than $74,000 trying to get his son, Morris Esformes, into Penn and on the basketball team.
Why couldn’t Allen just offer Esformes’ son a scholarship, one may ask. The answer to that question is quite simple — Ivy League schools don’t offer athletic scholarships, so the only way into Penn was through bribery, as it seems. The plan didn’t work out as Allen was let go in 2015 after a dismal 9-19 season and Esformes never made it on the team.
The same year Allen was canned at Penn, the Celtics offered him a spot on Brad Steven’s assistant coach roster. It looked like Allen’s past would stay buried, but bad choices have a funny way of coming back to haunt a person. tTis came back on Allen when the indictment was filed against Esformes, which in turn, let all of the sour details out to the public.
Should we really be surprised that we have yet another scandal in college basketball? The NCAA has long been the land of scandals and do-badders, who constantly try to tell us, with a straight face no less, that the organization runs a tight ship and only acts in the moral interest of student-athletes.
Next: Trace McSorley takes center stage at Penn State
If one believes that lie, then there’s a castle in Orlando that I would like to sell to you.