Syracuse basketball head coach Jim Boeheim says the Ivy League’s eligibility policy is “silly.” That’s putting it nicely.
Jimmy Boeheim, the oldest son of Syracuse basketball head coach Jim Boeheim, is in a tough spot.
Amid the novel coronavirus pandemic, the Ivy League has canceled all sports through the end of the fall semester, and winter sports such as basketball can’t commence until mid-December at the earliest, according to an article from Mike Waters of Syracuse.com.
What’s more, the Ivy League’s policy of typically not allowing student-athletes to have a fifth year of eligibility will remain in effect, Waters writes.
Jimmy Boeheim, a forward, is entering his senior term with Cornell, after he paced the Big Red in scoring a stanza ago, collecting 16.7 points per contest in 2019-20.
Waters notes that since Ivy League basketball squads won’t start the 2020-21 campaign on time, that leaves seniors such as Boeheim with a decision to make.
They can either suit up for a shortened schedule in their senior stints, or they could sit out 2020-21 and potentially look to transfer to a different crew as a graduate student for the 2021-22 season.
Personally, I think that Boeheim should take a year off, then transfer to the Orange, where he could play alongside his younger brother, shooting guard Buddy Boeheim, in 2021-22.
Jim Boeheim would coach, Buddy Boeheim would reside in his senior term, and Jimmy Boeheim would compete as a grad transfer. Fun, but not all that likely!
For Ivy League officials to cancel fall sports, delay winter sports and not budge – at least to date – on providing players with an extra stanza of eligibility during a pandemic seems completely short-sighted.
Syracuse basketball head coach Jim Boeheim said the Ivy League ought to reconsider its eligibility policy.
In an interview earlier this week with ESPN’s Seth Greenberg and Dan Dakich, Jim Boeheim called the situation with the Ivy League “silly,” per Waters.
"“Ivy League players are all going to have to make a decision if they’ll play at all or play somewhere else next year, unless the Ivy League is willing to grant kids an extra year of eligibility, which they’ve never done – I don’t know why,” Boeheim said. “Hopefully, they will come to some reasonable decision that these kids deserve to play a fifth year because of this pandemic.”"
Boeheim also said, “I think the Ivy League doesn’t realize, they act like sports doesn’t matter to their students. I think they misread that. I think the athletes in the Ivy League work just as hard as our guys do and love it just as much.”
The Syracuse basketball head coach is spot on in his assessment, and how the Ivy League is treating Jimmy Boeheim and other student-athletes in this conference is unacceptable.