Oklahoma State’s Marcus Smart needs to be suspended. He needs to pay a price for his disgusting, disrespectful actions Saturday night at the end of his team’s loss at Texas Tech.
The length of that suspension is in the hands of officials from the Big 12 Conference, Oklahoma State and Texas Tech. The NCAA has no jurisdiction in this matter. We trust they will do the right thing because a message has to be sent to college athletes that this is not OK. Athletes cannot go after fans. I am not absolving the fan of any blame. More on that later.
The important thing is that this type of thing cannot be tolerated. Watching the actions unfold on live television, I was worried the situation was going to become much worse. The potential for a riot was there. Thank goodness that didn’t happen.
A suspension is just the first step. A one-game or two-game suspension will hurt Smart and Oklahoma State. The Cowboys, the preseason favorite to win the Big 12 and a top 10 team just a couple of weeks ago, have lost four straight and five of six. Suddenly they are in danger of missing the NCAA tournament because they have fallen to 16-7 overall and and 4-6 in the Big 12.
Smart should not be allowed to play Tuesday when OSU is at Texas. And if he is suspended for Saturday’s game against Oklahoma as well, that is a stiff penalty. His teammates will be hard pressed to win without him. But there are six games remaining after that, including rematches with Baylor, Texas Tech, Kansas, Kansas State and Iowa State – all teams that have defeated the Cowboys to this point.
Whatever was said to Smart, he should know better. He used very poor judgement. The fact that he didn’t calm down, the fact that his body language remained frightening as he was escorted to the locker room after the game, all contribute to a prescription and a desperate need for Smart to get counseling.
It was just Jan. 25 that Smart made headlines when he kicked a folding chair on the OSU bench during a victory over West Virginia. He apologized. I have no idea how Oklahoma State handled that situation but coach Travis Ford and his staff obviously didn’t go far enough in warning Smart against further demonstrations of his frustration and anger.
And, by the way, every player gets frustrated during the course of a season. All great players are competitors. The people who are using that as excuses for Smart need to stop. If he had left for the NBA after his freshman season, he would likely be facing frustration as a pro rookie. The NBA suffered through a horrible lesson in the “Malice at the Palace” incident. College basketball has to make some changes now.
Smart has had a difficult season. His shot has failed him. He has been accused of being a flooper. Social media hasn’t been kind to him. I understand all that and there are pressures in this world that didn’t exist even 10 years ago. But someone needs to sit down with Smart and watch the movie “42.” Teach him the lesson of Jackie Robinson. I think it might be lost on many of our most visible athletes today.
In addition to Smart and Ford, I blame the fan who was shoved, and the two women around him. We now know him as Jeff Orr. He is famous. Evidently he was a pretty big man on campus before this, well known through the Big 12, and given a license by Texas Tech since they have promoted the man as their No. 1 fan with a video honoring his loyalty and willingness to drive thousands of miles supporting a program that Bob Knight couldn’t even turn into a consistent winner.
It didn’t take long for a video to surface on Twitter Saturday night of Orr making an an obscene gesture at Texas A&M’s Bryan Davis during a game in 2010. We don’t know yet what Orr said to Smart but just from video evidence his actions in that 2010 game were even worse. Texas Tech spokesman Blayne Beal told ESPN, “We have never had an issue with [Orr] crossing the line in the past. We are not endorsing that gesture from the Texas A&M game. It just did not rise up to be any kind of issue.”
Not an issue? What does it take to be an issue? A full-out riot? The Texas Tech fans stormed the floor Saturday night. Smart was out there. Fortunately, no crazy fan went after Smart. Security did a horrible job in many ways. College athletic department officials have to come to grips with this in our society. What if a fan gains entrance with a knife or a gun?
Don’t say it can’t happen. In all the games I’ve entered at Gampel Pavilion at Connecticut this season, no one checks my briefcase. It is checked at the XL Center in Hartford, but not in Storrs. I have thought about that all season.
The placement of “donor” seats on the floor of so many college arenas (an obvious revenue stream) is dangerous too. This type of interaction is possible on so many levels that it is frightening.
Big 12 coordinator of officials Curtis Shaw told ESPN that the game officials have no jurisdiction to eject a player involved in an altercation with a fan. All the game stoppages we’ve seen this season to review tape of flagrant fouls and that did not take place Saturday night in Lubbock.
College basketball needs to address this and give game officials some form of authority to handle a situation of this type. There were only a few seconds left in the game. At the very least, Oklahoma State should have taken Smart to the locker room.
College athletes are subjected to many things that pro athletes do not have to face. It’s the nature of the crowd. We do not know what was said to Smart. There has been speculation it was racial in nature and maybe it was. Former Oklahoma State star Desmond Mason tweeted this last night, about the way he was treated during games in Lubbock:
This had been a fun college basketball season without controversy. That changed Saturday night. It’s time to deal with this. Do it now – before something worse takes place and we all regret it.
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