The chairman of the Maryland University Board of Regents, James T. Brady, stepped down early on Thursday, following immense criticism from students, fans, politicians and players regarding the board’s original decision to retain head football coach DJ Durkin. Durkin came under scrutiny following the death of 19-year-old team member Jordan McNair, who was hospitalized after collapsing due to heat stroke on the practice field in the spring. McNair would never recover, dying two weeks later in the hospital. Durkin and his program were under investigation by the university regarding McNair's death and the reportedly abusive culture of the program.
Due to the outpouring of complaints over Durkin’s reinstatement last Wednesday, he was officially fired by the university's president just 24 hours later, and a day later, Brady resigned from his post. In the end, Maryland did the right thing, but their initial reinstatement of Durkin highlights the power and immunity that many coaches hold in NCAA sports, and prompts a larger look at why they have so much unchecked authority. McNair’s story is tragic, as he and Maryland teammates faced extreme physical and psychological abuse at the hands of Maryland strength and conditioning coach Rick Court that ultimately led to the worst possible end, and McNair's experience is not the only example of this type of abuse from coaches.
Famed coach of the Indiana men's basketball team, Bobby Knight, is widely known for his verbal and physical abuse of players and other members of his program, as shown in a video leaked and aired on CNN of him grabbing and choking former Indiana player Neil Reed during a team practice in 1997. Former Rutgers Men's Basketball Coach Mike Rice Jr. was exposed in 2013 when ESPN aired tape of him kicking and throwing balls at players while also verbally abusing players using profanities and homophobic slurs. There are many more examples, and while many coaches are fired immediately by their respective universities’ when the allegations come into the public eye, but it shouldn’t require public exposure and outrage to eliminate this behavior.
The problem lies mainly with the lack of an institution in place to properly oversee these coaches, which allows coaches to wield their power in abusive ways for far too long with no checks. Following an analysis of institutional responsibility and governance over professional coaching conduct by the Drake Group in 2016, they released a report stating that “the obligations of coaches as professionals are neither documented nor policed by any professional or licensing organization for coaching. Higher education institution codes of conduct applicable to faculty and staff were also examined and found to be too generic and insufficient to address the elevated risks that exist in athletic programs.”
Coaches’ hold a disproportionate amount of power over their athletes, not only in deciding playing time and much of the student-athlete’s schedule, but also in giving or rescinding a scholarship. While coaches can be amazing influences in athletes' lives, an extreme power dynamic indisputably exists. It is the responsibility of the NCAA and conference administrators to create a code of ethics and system of oversight to make sure the power of coaches do not go unchecked.
Weidner's Words: Free rein of college coaches
