Penn State Scandal: Why Penn State Should Not Receive NCAA Punishment

I would like to say that this article by no ways and means understates or minimizes the atrocities that occurred at Penn State. Jo Pa should have been more proactive. However, amongst this scandal there have been calls for Penn State to receive NCAA sanctions or to the extreme for Penn State to receive the dreaded death penalty.

I am here to say that none of these actions should be taken against Penn State because the damage that this scandal brought to Penn State is all ready far greater than any penalty the NCAA could ever deliver. 

Penn State receiving NCAA sanctions would not help the victims of Sandusky’s terrible actions; it would only hurt the student athletes playing at Penn State. The players and future recruits were not responsible for what happened in the showers, they were still in elementary school when it happened.  

Any sanctions given to Penn State that would involve sanctions would probably be redundant and unneeded. Many recruits have begun de-committing from their commitments to attend Penn State. The harm to Penn State’s reputation is already having the same effect as any NCAA sanction.

Another problem is that the NCAA cannot administer the death penalty that some people are clamoring for. The death penalty’s technically is the Repeat Violators Clause. The rule can only be implemented if a school committed violations during the period of probation that was earlier given as a result of previous wrong doings. 

Penn State isn’t under any sort of NCAA sanctions currently so that would entail the NCAA needing to write new rules and expanding the use to include Penn State’s current situation. That would then entail the NCAA would have to retro-actively punish Penn State, and as we all know, an organization cannot administer punishment for breaking a rule that didn’t exist when the original action occurred.    

Those responsible for the covering up of the scandal like Jo Pa and the Athletic Director have all been fired. In fact, the AD is facing perjury charges and of course Jerry Sandusky is facing plenty of child molestation charges.

Jo Pa, Penn State, the former AD and Jerry Sandusky are all going to face massive lawsuits by the victims and their families. Those lawsuits are going to have the effect of forcing Penn State to clean house of any taint from the scandal and be able to move forward.  

I do not claim to know what the right solution to solve this entire fiasco for Penn State is, but the massive lawsuits, future recruiting troubles and the eternal black mark for the institution will force the school to do some true soul searching.