Frost suspects Beavers talked to exiting players
First-year Nebraska football coach Scott Frost said the transfers of three of his former players to Oregon State raised his suspicions, though he stopped short of leveling a tampering charge against the Beavers.
Quarterback Tristan Gebbia, receiver Tyjon Lindsey and linebacker Avery Roberts all transferred from Nebraska to Oregon State in the past two months. It was part of the reason Frost listed Oregon State as one of the schools Greg Bell couldn’t transfer to as a condition of granting the running back’s scholarship release last week.
The Cornhuskers’ previous staff has deep ties to Oregon State, and former Nebraska assistant Trent Bray returned there to coach linebackers this season. Former director of football operations Dan Van De Riet has gone back to Oregon State in the same role. Mike Riley, the coach Frost replaced at Nebraska, was a longtime Oregon State head coach who now is a consultant for the Beavers.
“There’s no doubt in my mind those kids were probably in touch with some people they formerly knew that were here,” Frost said Thursday.
It’s against NCAA rules for representatives of a school to contact a player from another school about transferring. Frost’s decision on Bell was made 10 days before NCAA transfer rules change. Starting Oct. 15, athletes will no longer have to ask for permission to transfer from their current schools and schools cannot block transfers.
“If someone is contacting our kids while they’re still our kids and trying to get them to transfer, I’m not going to be a big fan of that continuing to happen,” Frost said. “And I’m not saying it did happen.”
Oregon State athletics spokesman Steve Fenk said the school had no response to Frost’s comments.
Frost said he would be a hypocrite if he didn’t acknowledge he spoke to Central Florida quarterback McKenzie Milton on Wednesday. Frost developed a strong relationship with Milton as his coach while leading the Knights the past two seasons. Frost said the two spoke on the video service Facetime because it was Milton’s birthday.
The Pac-12 will make immediate changes to how video replay reviews are handled after conference commissioner Larry Scott admitted procedural mistakes were made when a targeting foul was not called during last month’s Washington State at Southern California game.
Scott responded Thursday to a report on the review by Yahoo Sports that cited an internal conference document. The document showed a replay official at the stadium believed he and officials working at the league’s review command center had been overruled by a Pac-12 executive on a targeting call against Washington State linebacker Logan Tago on Sept. 21 at Southern California.
“We mixed administrative oversight and leadership with real-time replay-review calls, made by experts, on the field, in the stadium and in the command center,” Scott said at Pac-12 basketball media day in San Francisco. “Moreover, we’ve allowed for ambiguity about who’s got the final call and who makes the ultimate decisions in replay review.”
The report said the replay official at the game and the command center agreed that, in addition to the roughing-the-passer foul that was called on the field, a targeting penalty should also be enforced. That would have resulted in the ejection of Tago. The report said a “third party” did not agree, and the targeting call was removed.
Scott acknowledged the third party was Woodie Dixon, the Pac-12’s general counsel and senior vice president of business affairs who also oversees football. Dixon and director of officials David Coleman oversee the command center, though they are not necessarily there during games; Dixon often attends games on Saturdays.
“It was not his intention and he didn’t believe he was making a decision; he believed he was trying to offer a point of view, angles on the call, trying to bring together consistency with other calls that he wanted our replay officials to consider in making the decisions,” Scott said. “Having said that … they clearly interpreted it as a decision or a directive. From my perspective, that’s enough. Even if it wasn’t intended, and I’m confident it wasn’t intended as he’s making the decision.”
Scott said Dixon and Coleman will not be involved in any more discussion about calls being made at the replay review command center.
Reviews reviewed
Hoosiers RB done?
Running back Morgan Ellison may have played his last down at Indiana after a university panel determined he sexually assaulted a female student.
The conclusions of the panel were first reported by The Indianapolis Star. A person with knowledge of the accusations confirmed the panel’s decision Thursday to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because the details have not been made public.
Ellison has not been charged with a crime and it was not immediately known whether he has an attorney. An athletic department official declined to comment, citing privacy laws.
In its findings, the school’s sexual misconduct hearing panel said Ellison should be suspended from Indiana for 2 1/2 years and required to undergo counseling. During the hearing, Ellison denied using force and said the incident was consensual, the Star reported. He can appeal the decision.
Ellison led the Hoosiers in rushing in 2017 as a freshman with 704 yards and six touchdowns but was suspended indefinitely before this year’s opener. Coach Tom Allen said last week that Ellison had returned to practice, but he spoke the day before the panel’s decision, which is dated Oct. 3.