On Wednesday, Rutgers president Robert Barchi announced that the school’s head football coach has been suspended for three weeks and fined $50,000. The investigation began when Flood sent an email, from a private address, to a professor inquiring into the academic standing of Nadir Barnwell, whose status had been in question. He is the only staff member with previous head coaching experience. Flood also was found to have provided grammatical and editorial suggestions to a paper that Barnwell had turned in to the faculty member.
Advertisement
According to the letter, Rutgers has alerted the NCAA and is investigating whether any NCAA rules were broken. In addition to the issue with contacting a faculty member, Rutgers’ football program has been plagued by off-the-field arrests.
Along with being a regional rival of Syracuse, Rutgers’ success, or lack thereof, impacts Syracuse heavily because both school compete fiercely for New Jersey recruits. Flood faced a reprimand or suspension as part of the investigation. From reading our fellow SB Nation site On The Banks I know that Rutgers fans don’t have lot of faith in the reporting done by NJ.com, but I’m going to guess they didn’t run this without confirmation. “That’s a serious issue for us because we are very concerned about academic integrity and the fact that we keep a strong separation between the classroom and athletics so there is not inappropriate pressure on the academics and the faculty with regards to students who are in their courses”. “We all want the same things for our student-athletes”.
After being told he can not have contact with professors about student-athletes, Flood told the advisor, “This conversation stays between you and me”.
Barnwell was recently dismissed from the football program after being arrested for allegedly assaulting a group of students with other football players, according to the Middlesex County Prosecutor’s Office. Carroo was charged with simple assault in a domestic violence incident.
“He has accepted responsibility for his actions and my discipline”, Barchi said”.
Flood did attend his usual Monday news conference, as did a handful of players including starting quarterback Chris Laviano and Big Ten special teams player of the week Janarion Grant. Norries Wilson will serve as interim head coach during Flood’s suspension. One of the former players was also charged in two home-invasion robberies.
Advertisement
Flood’s suspension comes three days before Rutgers (1-1) faces Penn State in its Big Ten opener. The paper was never graded after being submitted, and the grade was not changed. Our faculty must have complete independence in executing their duties and there is a reason why we prohibit athletics coaching staff from discussing the academic standing of students with faculty.
