Sports Radio Interviews

Kevin O’Neill Doesn’t Think the Punishment is Fair to His Players

When talking about Southern California, the conversation usually begins with Pete Carroll and his football team.  However, the past couple of years, the USC basketball program has started to emerge thanks in large part to former coach Tim Floyd.  Under Floyd, the team made three consecutive NCAA tournament appearances and had three straight 20-win seasons.  Along with that, USC got national recognition because they were able to lure prized high school recruit O.J. Mayo to Southern Cal.  However, the team may be paying the price now for bringing Mayo to USC. 

This season the USC basketball team is 10-4 and they have won eight straight games.  Unfortunately, no matter how many games they win, there will be no postseason for the Trojans.  There has been an ongoing investigation by the NCAA into allegations that Mayo received improper cash and gifts while at USC.  Because of that, the university decided to impose sanctions on the team for recruiting violations involving him that included a ban on postseason play, including the Pac 10 Tournament, this season.  It’s a tough break for a team that had high expectations this season in the Pac 10.  It becomes even tougher to swallow for the players and coaches at the university now who had nothing to do with what happened at USC when Mayo was there.  The people being punished had nothing to do with what happened, the people involved in the allegations are no longer there and yet they are the ones most affected by this.  It’s unfair and it’s time for the NCAA to take a long look at this policy of punishment.

Kevin O’Neill joined ESPN Radio Los Angeles on LA Sports Live to talk about the punishment that the university came up with, how the team took the news, whether or not this is a fair punishment, and what the team will do moving forward.

On how he broke the news to his team:

“I met with them at 10:15 on Sunday morning, I told them the situation and naturally they are disappointed, a little disheartened, but I have a lot of respect for this group.  I think they’ll play and keep going the way they know how to play and take care of their business.”

On how the team and the seniors took the news:

“Nobody took it well.  Something like that would be impossible to take well but I’m sure it will get easier by the day.  It’s shocking news to hear obviously.  For them, they’re just gonna have to make every game a postseason game.”

On whether or not he knew something was going to happen when he took the job:

“I knew something was going to happen.  It’s impossible to have a two year major investigation and not have something come out of it obviously.  Mike Garrett was very honest with me from the beginning and all the way through and has been great.  There was something that had to happen at some point and we just have to move ahead with it.”

On whether or not he expects further punishment from the NCAA:

“I have no idea.  That’s something that I don’t have any information about or any knowledge about.  I think we punished ourselves pretty severely when you look at it totally but they’ll have to make their ruling whenever they make their ruling.”

On whether or not he thinks the punishment is fair:

“It isn’t fair to be honest with you.  It’s like going out to dinner.  Sometime people eat and somebody else pays the check and that’s kinda what unfortunately has happened with us.  I feel terrible for our players because we have really good, hardworking guys that deserve opportunities but life isn’t fair and sometimes it stinks and you just gotta deal with it.”

On how he is going to maintain the focus of the players:

“What we have to do is we have to concentrate on being better as a team every day.  We have to approach every game like it’s a postseason game for us because that’s all we have left.  We have 16 games in our league to play and it’s our job as coaches and players to play the best we can in those games.”

Listen to Kevin O’Neill on ESPN Radio LA here

Tags: ESPN Radio LA, Kevin O'Neill, O.J. Mayo Allegations, OJ Mayo, Tim Floyd, University of Souther California Basketball