The Register Citizen (Torrington, CT)
NCAA denies waiver for Westbrook
UConn plans to appeal decision
STORRS — The NCAA has turned down UConn’s eligibility waiver request for Tennessee transfer Evina Westbrook, Geno Auriemma said Friday before practice.
“I’m disappointed,” he said. “I’m disappointed personally because I don’t agree with how this system works. There should be, anybody who transfers has to sit out, no questions asked. Or, you know what, anybody who transfers, there’s a onetime waiver.”
Westbrook, a 6foot guard, transferred to UConn in May after Holly Warlick was fired as Tennessee’s coach. Auriemma said the school plans to file an appeal which, if denied, would keep Westbrook out for the 201920 season.
Westbrook averaged 14.9 points and 5.3 assists (both teamhighs) across 31 starts as a sophomore at Tennessee. The Huskies were hoping to add her to what’s already a deep backcourt consisting of American Athletic Conference Preseason CoPlayer of the Year Crystal Dangerfield, Christyn Williams and Anna Makurat. But now — barring a swift
reversal — that appears unlikely.
“With all the issues going on in the NCAA, this is what we’re going to do?” Auriemma, his voice rising, asked rhetorically. “We’re going to sit around in a room and arbitrarily decide who’s worthy and who’s not? And then they wonder why there’s an uproar over how the NCAA is operated.
“I’m really, really, really disappointed.”
Under NCAA rules, players are required to sit out a year after transferring, though exceptions are sometimes made in the case of circumstances out of their control. Auriemma didn’t delve into specifics about the issues Westbrook dealt with at Tennessee, but he suggested they were troubling enough to merit stronger consideration for her approval.
“You start to wonder, do people who work at the NCAA actually have any idea what goes on on campuses? Or should this decision be actually made by people who are on campuses, people who have coached, people who have been administrators?” Auriemma said. “One of the comments that was made by the committee was what was happening to Evina was pretty much normal. Well, if that’s normal then you know what, everybody else that I talked to has been doing it the wrong way.
“If one of my players went through what Evina went through, I think there’d be an investigation here, and it wouldn’t be normal.”
Tennessee went 1913 in 2019, failing to reach 20 wins for the first time in 43 years. Following a loss to UCLA in the first round of the NCAA Tournament, Westbrook expressed doubt about her coach’s job status, telling reporters, “I don’t know, I really don’t know,” when asked if she expected Warlick to return. Four days later, Warlick was fired and ultimately replaced by former guard Kellie ( Jolly) Harper.
Westbrook, the former No. 2 recruit in the country, was one of four players brought in this offseason, joining Makurat, freshman guard Aubrey Griffin and exMurray State forward Evelyn Adebayo, a graduate transfer. Westbrook underwent left knee surgery in June, forcing the team to limit her reps during the preseason. She was expected to be ready for the Nov. 10 opener against Cal.
Her decision to leave Tennessee for, of all places, UConn, was the latest layer of intrigue in the sport’s greatest rivalry. Auriemma said Tennessee could’ve been more cooperative during the waiver process, but he doesn’t think anything was done out of spite.
It was clear where his anger was directed.
“It’s not cut and dry,” he said, regarding the waiver process. “So either let everybody transfer or let nobody transfer. This doesn’t seem to be working very well for anybody. What it does then is it creates a ‘Why was it yes for them and no for them?’ What’s the difference? … What is the criteria? Well, it’s these things. Well, we checked off every box, but you decided it wasn’t good enough.”
UConn athletic director Dave Benedict shared Auriemma’s disappointment, saying in a statement he was surprised by the ruling.
“I was surprised for many reasons but mostly because the NCAA talks to us about serving the best interest of the student,” Benedict wrote. “It recognizes that there are situations in which a student shouldn’t have to sit out a year. It tells us what those are and what is required to prove it. And then you provide that — without opposition from the prior school — and you get denied.”