another bullet for the other WCHA coaches to use against Eaves. If I were a prospective recruit, I would have a hard time committing there knowing you could be kicked to the curb at any time

There’s two methods typically employed to ditch a recruit. If you inherit them from a previous coach, you can back out on a VERBAL scholarship offer. Or, if they are your recruit, you offer to honor the scholarship for ONE YEAR but tell them they’ll likely NEVER SEE ICETIME. Actually recinding a verbal to one of your own recruits almost NEVER happens.

I agree with Bugsy and warn potential Badger recruits to not commit unless it’s for the following season (in which case there’s no time for them to back out). Eaves is well known for setting short deadlines to make a commitment decision, but don’t fall for it kids.

The problem isn’t that Eaves rescinded a scholarship offer. In isolation, I don’t have a issue with that. What it does do is help to further erode the NCAA’s justification for what they are, as if they needed any more assistance with that.

If getting and keeping a scholarship is entirely about the ability to perform athletically, then the NCAA’s case that the athletes aren’t employees falls apart. They won in court, in the infamous Marc Buoniconti case, by making several arguments that we all know are implausible. These included saying that the primary focus of NCAA athletics is on the classroom not the field, and that generating revenue is not a factor at all in how the programs are run.

If Crandall lost an offer of a scholarship based purely on not playing well in the USHL, it makes a mockery of the first of these arguments. The NCAA testified under oath about this. What Mike Eaves helps to demonstrate is that they committed perjury. Their arguments were and are false, and there really isn’t any logical reason to not consider the athletes to be employees, just as graduate assistants in academic departments are considered employees if they receive tuition assistance.

I realize that a finding that the athletes are employees would upend, and probably destroy, college athletics as we currently know them. Given my feelings about the NCAA, I consider this to be a feature, not a bug, though I recognize that not everyone would agree. What I can’t understand is how there is any sort of moral argument that the athletes shouldn’t have the same protections as any employee. This would include the schools being responsible for on the job injuries.

Chuck, I think you miss the broader point here. Crandall’s is not an isolated case, Eaves has done this with several verbal commitments recently. It’s like the airlines practice — overbook the flight and you’re pretty much guaranteed to fly at full capacity. Tough hop to those left at the terminal waiting for standby. The greater point is that with all the verbal commitments he solicits, there’s nearly a mathematical certainty that some of those kids will never end up wearing a UW sweater, so how would Chuck feel to get yanked about like that?

Personally, as a fan, I don’t see a huge problem with the methods of “ditching” a recruit Exiled One describes, because verbal commitments are not binding. I think even Adam Crandall today would admit it’s better to have the coach level with you now rather than signing the LOI, getting to campus only then to figure out you’re viewed as a third- or fourth-stringer. If I were a potential recruit however, I’d be very skeptical while listening to Eaves or his staff telling me how much they’d love for me to come play for them at Madison.

It’s too bad, I haven’t seen Crandall play since the Class A semis against Duluth Marshall in ’07, and I remember thinking the Badgers scored a coup when they got a commit from him. He seemed so polished as a high schooler, hard to fathom how he could have fallen off so sharply since then. Hope he is able to get his sh** together and catch on somewhere else.

Bottomline is UW needs a goalie ready to play D1 hockey this fall, and Crandall continues to demonstrate that he is no where near ready for that each time he hits the ice…he is nothing short of brutual in the USHL. While it is unpleasant and even a touch untaudry, Eaves has a responsibility to field a competitive team. If the returner struggled or got hurt, and Crandall was the only option and totally brutual as his USHL performance of this year would suggest he would be, Eaves would have fans calling for his head. For those that want to hang their hat that this situation wil cost UW and Eaves recruits in the future, the flip side of losing lots of games because you don’t have a competent D1 goalie would have the exact same effect.

Lafavs, this situation is way different then any of the recent UW decommits most of which it is hard to cast blame on Eaves unless you are predisposed to hating him and or the Badgers. Wiercioch committed as an either 08 OR 09, and 3 months later was backing out of his commitment when he had an oppurtunity come open at DU when Carle had his career end (I have no doubt the OR part of his offer was having McBain or McDonagh go pro early). Erstad did not want to play another year in the USHL (as was the plan all along as he was a verbal for 09) and decided to play D3 in his home town for a coach he is familiar with (which by most accounts had the UW staff livid to lose him…aka he was hardly pushed away). Pryor initially said academics were an issue and then said they weren’t and that he just changed his mind…you can read between the lines that he was “pushed” out, or you can look at is as things changed in the 2 years since he committed as a 15/16 year old. Last Montpetit said he was miffed at only getting 90% of school paid and that he was promised a “full ride” which most that follow college recruiting realize that 90% is pretty much as good as it gets. Not sure what to make of this, but he had a ride on the table and it was clearly his choice to look elsewhere.