If you’re a Cincinnati Bearcats fan (or just followed the Bob Huggins’ era) and are watching a situation at Indiana that looks like a university/head coach (read: Kelvin Sampson) throwing an assistant (read: Rob Senderoff, above) under the bus to save the big guy, you’ll think of one name: John Loyer.
And we’re pretty darn sure Loyer would look ask the same question as us: Is it really worth it?
Who is John Loyer? A man who, four plus years after his termination at UC, told The Cincinnati
Enquirer this:
“You’re always going to be bitter,” Loyer said March 1, 2003. “I invested 10 years of a career and put a lot of hard work into building that program, and I didn’t get to reap the benefits you should reap when you’re successful”
“I wasted 10 years of my life at Cincinnati”.
Flash back nine years to 1998. Follow us after the jump for Loyer’s story.
John Loyer’s career started, and nearly ended, through his loyalty to one man: Bob Huggins. He was recruited to play for him at Akron, and was so cerebral Huggins kept him as an assistant for two years. When Cincinnati hired him as head coach in 1989, Huggins only brought with one coach from Akron: Loyer. At 24, he was about to become a key part of one of the best programs of the 1990’s.
In 1992, the Bearcats reached the school’s first Final Four in near 30 years. In 1996, UC made the Elite Eight for the third time in five seasons. And in October ‘96, Cincinnati started the season as the number-one ranked team in both the coaches and press poll. All this came through players Loyer, Huggins and the UC staff recruited.
But it was a player from that 96-97 class, the one that pumped Cincinnati to the pre-season top ranking, that would undo Loyer’s college coaching career.
His name was Charles Williams.
Williams was a JuCo point guard many thought would be the key to the Cincinnati offense, possibly enough to push them to a national title. He played at Chaffey Junior College in California, and had his pick of colleges. He chose UC, and the Bearcats trumpeted him as the guy to feed Danny Forston the ball again and again on the road to the Final Four.
One problem: Williams didn’t have enough credit hours to complete his JuCo degree by August of ‘96. That one problem rolled into many more for UC.
The NCAA initially accused Loyer and UC of everything from improperly registering Williams on the second-to-last day of summer classes (so he could be eligible for the 96-97 NCAA season) to free meals; from misleading investigators to even free tickets to Cincinnati Bengals football games (this was 1996: Does anyone realize that was more a punishment than benefit?).
In the end, the NCAA found only Loyer and the school guilty of improper registering of Williams for summer classes, and Loyer guilty of initially misleading investigators (Loyer said he cleared this up later). It put UC on two years probation, ruled the Bearcats to lose a couple of scholarships, official recruiting visits were cut and Loyer was banned from off-campus recruiting for a year.
Sound familiar? Rob, are you listening?
In early December of 1998, UC officially terminated Loyer. In a letter, President Joseph A. Steger told him:
“I have determined it is not in the best interests of the men’s basketball program for you to remain on the coaching staff”.
Anyone want to guess who stayed? You know the answer: Huggins.
Since then, Loyer has picked up his career: A year after his termination he became head coach of Wabash Valley JC (Ill.), one of the most successful junior college hoops teams in the land. He left in 2000, but the next season the kids he recruited won the JuCo national title. He then winded his way through the NBA ranks, from video coordinator alll the way to assistant coach, where he is today as one of Maurice Cheeks’ top assistants with the Philadelphia 76ers.
Did Huggins know what was going on? Were any of us born yesterday? Yet as frustrating as it was for for Loyer and now is for Senderoff, John Loyer’s story should give Rob hope things can get better, at least personally.
Just don’t count on them changing in the broad scheme of the college game anytime soon.
Firing Rob Senderhoff is a last ditch effort by Rick Greenspan, Kelvin Sampson, and the IU athletic department to stem the tide of NCAA investigations that’s sure to come.
Greenspan and Sampson are pure scum for this move to a man Sampson called “A man of integrity, honesty, and someone I want associated with the IU program” when hired.
If there is a Hell, and I’m sure there is, Kelvin Sampson should spend forever there for this raping of a man only following his bosses directions.
Good luck Rob. You did wrong, but not as wrong as your bosses. Your coaching career is over, as I’m sure your aware. Good luck providing for your family as Sampson and Greenspan eat steak and pat each other on the back.
Excellent analysis. This is a great blog. You can thank Jack Cobra for turning me on to your writing, and I will definitely put you on the blogroll at STF.