After four years, we still have a few more hours to wait before we know exactly what former Heisman winner Reggie Bush did during his sophomore and junior seasons at Southern California, at least in the estimation of NCAA investigators. But we do know Wednesday night that USC has the long-awaited results of the NCAA investigation in hand, finally. And according to ESPN's Bruce Feldman and the Los Angeles Times, the response isn't going to be a light touch:
A two-year bowl ban and a loss of more than 20 football scholarships are among the sanctions that the NCAA has dealt USC, a source with knowledge of the situation said Wednesday.
[...]
Limited recruiting contacts, probation and forfeiture of victories are also among the penalties regarded as possibly in play.
USC sources, who requested anonymity because they are not authorized to speak about the situation publicly, said they were bracing for the worst. ... Asked if the sanctions were appropriate, a source said, "It depends how you look at it. It is if you're a UCLA fan."
If that's accurate, we are in for some interesting reading when the report is released Thursday morning: 20 scholarships and a two-year bowl ban is nearly identical to the sentence the NCAA levied against Alabama in 2002, the last really heavy-handed retribution on record; back then, the Tide were docked 21 scholarships over two years and put on five years probation.
Given the extreme corruption targeted in the 'Bama case, the strong punishment here is a good indication that most of the evidence and testimony linking Bush to more than $290,000 in cash and prizes from would-be agents in 2004-05 was accepted as fact by the Committee on Infractions. It's also an indication that a) Someone at USC was aware of the fact that Bush was or might have been accepting money from unsavory characters skulking around the program, or b) The sheer scale of the scandal was of such staggering magnitude that somehow not knowing a star player is accepting improper benefits from agent-type entities is just as bad as knowing and failing to stop or report it.
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