30 biggest college basketball scandals of all time

25. Kentucky players shave points in the 1940s

There have been a lot of point-shaving scandals in college basketball over the years, but the infamous 1951 point-shaving scheme was the biggest. Seven different schools were implicated, including another example later in this list, but the largest brand caught in this scheme was Kentucky.

The Wildcats under Adolph Rupp were one of the nation’s most dominant programs in the late 1940s, and their teams were anchored by some excellent players, including guard Ralph Beard and center Alex Groza. The pair became basketball icons, winning a pair of national championships at Kentucky and helping the United States win a gold medal at the 1948 Olympics.

The unfortunate part of all this is that Beard, Groza, and teammate Dale Barnstable took money from gamblers to affect the outcomes of several Kentucky games. The scheme was exposed and everyone involved suffered heavily, including Kentucky.

Beard and Groza were off to promising starts in the NBA, but their careers were over when league president Maurice Podoloff banned all players involved in the scandal for life. Kentucky was forced to cancel the 1952-1953 season as a result of their involvement in the scheme, and also for numerous other rules violations such as illegally paying players and allowing ineligible athletes to compete.

The Wildcats, in essence, received the NCAA’s first true death penalty as a result of this scandal. They are the only school caught in this scandal to actually recover and go on to have more success, a tremendous credit to the work that Rupp did to rebuild Kentucky in the following years.