Ohio State's Compliance Department Needs a Housecleaning

The last thing Ohio State football needed was one more distraction in the week leading up to opening kickoff against Akron tomorrow.

On Saturday morning (actually Friday night), people will start setting up tailgates around Ohio Stadium, and by 10:00 a.m. tomorrow, parties will be in full swing with the entire state of Ohio ready to put this horrible summer behind them.

Not so fast. 

The late breaking news that Jordan Hall, Travis Howard and Corey Brown are suspended for receiving benefits of $300 or less at a charity golf outing served as one last kick in the shins for beleaguered Buckeye fans. 

For scandal-watchers, Ohio State is joining Miami as the gift that keeps on giving. In the grand scheme of things, this was a very minor violation. Three kids got gift bags at a golf outing. Fairly benign stuff, unless your school has already had an NCAA colonoscopy, as Ohio State has.

Are the kids to blame? Sure. You would think that in light of the tattoo scandal, the compliance department would have sent the very clear message that players should not accept anything without the prior approval of the Ohio State freebie police.

Their taking of the bags, as innocent as it may have been, showed bad judgment. But it's a fairly typical incident of poor judgment that does not paint the kids as bad characters. Instead, it shows that the lessons of this past summer, and the potentially drastic sanctions that will soon be handed down have not been drilled into the players' heads.

It also shows without a doubt that a fair amount of the problem clearly lies with Ohio State's so-called "compliance" department, headed by Doug Archie.

Mr. Archie himself is hardly setting a good example by receiving a free car from a dealership that employs players in part-time jobs. And he's the one who's supposed to tell the players they can't accept free stuff? 

Let's face it, the Ohio State Compliance Department has shown us this summer that they are not up to the task.

In the school's response to the NCAA Infractions Committee, Ohio State said it added two lawyers to the compliance staff. But it has held onto and not disciplined both Archie and the two attorneys already on staff who either turned a blind eye to what was going on, or were kept completely in the dark about it by the football staff.

Either way, there's a huge problem.

If they turned a blind eye they should be gone. If the football staff held no fear of the compliance office, it sent a clear message that there was no accountability, and the people who created and fostered that atmosphere should be gone just as quickly.

Ohio State can do itself a huge favor by sacking Doug Archie and anyone hired under his leadership. The total lack of accountability is not only appalling, it is placing the Buckeyes under scrutiny that would not be necessary if the compliance office did its job.