the recruit: Oday Aboushi

Some bits and pieces, first:

College Game Balls took the trouble of cooking up the 2009 ACC Helmet Schedule. He didn't call Virginia "France" so the least I can do is link it up. Enjoy.

Fluff article on Bob Pruett. And of course, a quote:

“If I could wave a magic wand, it would be that Cavalier fans understand that the glass is half full and not half empty,” Pruett said. “I believe that would help things tremendously around here because the players spend a lot of time out in this community."

I really think the program is a better one for having Pruett around even for one season. Shame he couldn't stay longer.

As for programming this weekend, it'll be limited. I'm skipping out on doing any sort of game preview for the Clemson game on Sunday. We're gonna lose - whaddaya want, and how many ways can I say it? Rather than making a bold prediction, I'm gonna do a little bit of behind-the-scenes stuff I've been neglecting. The only post this weekend will be my basketblogpoll ballot; I anticipate that changing only if we somehow win on Sunday or if there's a verbal commit or two that come from Junior Day. RB Kevin Parks is said to be interested in two things right now: Virginia, and not dealing with the recruiting process all summer, fall, and winter. So if there's a commit, it's likely him.

Onward.....

Name: Oday Aboushi
Position: OL
Hometown: Brooklyn, NY
School: Xaverian
Height: 6'6"
Weight: 300

ESPN: 78, #26 OT
Rivals: 5.8, four stars, #23 OT, #3 player in NY
Scout: three stars, #71 OT

Sophomore punter Jimmy Howell had a fine season last year, but was inconsistent. Coach Al Groh may have found his replacement in Aboushi, whose punts last season regularly topped 50 yards. His kicking likely wasn't accurate enough to challenge any of the incoming kickers, however. Fortunately, Aboushi is 300 pounds, so if punting doesn't work out, he can readily be shifted to offensive line, where he is said to have some experience.

Yes, I'm pretty feverish today, but no, I'm not hallucinating this - Aboushi was a renaissance man for Xaverian, playing both sides of the line as well as handling punting duties and even attempting that one field goal. When your punter is 300 pounds, how would you know if someone committed a roughing-the-kicker penalty? Guy would just bounce off.

Anyway, Aboushi is rather unilaterally highly rated by the scouting services, although Scout hands out stars like that stingy guy on Halloween handing out individual Smarties. Therefore I will rationalize his meh offer list by noting that NYC is a basketball gold mine and a football sandbox. Schools that go there to recruit are either Rutgers, Syracuse, or ones like us that know we can't call up just anyone in Florida and expect instant commitment. Aboushi justifies his rankings with a second-team all-state selection, so I'm putting to rest any notion that having only five offers means anything.

Aboushi's presence in the class, even before Morgan Moses joined up, made this the best class since 2005 for offensive linemen. He's a field-ready 300 pounds, and if he finds his path blocked at tackle he can slide inside to guard. If Moses can't qualify, Aboushi could find himself in the two-deep on September 5 with a strong showing in fall camp. I'm excited for his potential. It's surely premature to hope that he can make a surprise leap into the starting lineup all Austin Pasztor-style, but at 300 pounds, sooner rather than later is my hope for his contributions.

And I'll consider myself satisfied with the season if Groh trots him out to punt just once.

Bob Pruett retiring

Stepping down.

A loss to the program for sure. Pruett's fingerprints were all over this recruiting class in Hampton Roads and went a long way toward re-establishing our presence there. He wasn't going to be defensive coordinator this year as he was last year, but I was hoping he could leave a big mark on the team through a few classes' worth of recruiting efforts.

It sounds as though his wife is not doing especially well, health-wise. Best of luck to Pruett in his retirement. Not many coaches can stay for one year and be missed as strongly as Pruett will.

Groh announces starter!!1!1

Told you the Pruett thing ain't so bad. A short couple of days after new affidavits were filed in the case, which accused Bob Pruett of blatant violations of NCAA rules, one of the players who made a sworn statement recanted his testimony. If you read the articles that were linked to the other day, you might remember that the players' affidavits, at least in some cases, were the same, word for word. Fishy. Smells like a legal clerk printing up two copies of the same thing. Now half of that evidence is called into question. Not only will nothing come of this as far as our University is concerned, but the entire lawsuit itself may be dismissed.

Kickers. We have kickers. And per Kris at TheSabre, whose insider information is infinity times better than mine (because I have none, I'm just a loudmouth with opinions), we have an official pecking order for those kickers. Yannick Reyering, the sawker player, has been named the starter, barring total meltdown or injury. No, the quarterback hasn't been named, and we may as well assume that we'll have to wait til USC kickoff or after to find out who's gonna line up under center.

jackbooted thugs are not coming for Bob Pruett

I almost didn't write this post; I feel like wasting words and characters and stuff on this subject is not worth anybody's time. But it's a news item, and I'm a hits whore and would like to corner the market on traffic doing Google searches for "bob pruett horrible horrible scandal of doom".

The story, as you may already know, is that our new defensive coordinator, Bob Pruett, stands accused of various and sundry shenanigans, chicanery, and miscreanthood in an affidavit filed in a lawsuit against him, Marshall University, and various Marshall mucky-mucks. The accusations are related to the sanctions Marshall received in 2001 for said shenanigans, which were, as listed by the NCAA, impermissible employment of academic non-qualifiers, academic fraud and lack of institutional control.

This is all wel and bad, because UVA fans were in some consternation when former DC Mike London took the head job at Richmond; the hiring of Pruett made things more or less all better.

The problem is that the news is reporting this affidavit as brand-new, which it is, but the lawsuit is not. In fact the lawsuit is five years old. It was filed by David Ridpath, Marshall's compliance officer at the time, whose sole job was to keep Marshall out of such trouble as they got in.

The specific list of accusations can be found here; I won't go into listing them, they're already rather neatly summarized in the Gazette article. This can look rather bad, because the accusations are made by a couple different people, and on Marshall's side is Slimy Booster Guy, who, not at all coincidentally, was forced to temporarily sever ties with Marshall as part of the punishment; his rebuttal to the accusations is found in the second link above.

The down-low lowdown, or, Why Virginia Fans Shouldn't Worry:

- The NCAA statute of limitations for taking action on stuff is four years; Marshall was punished seven years ago.
- Pruett was not named in the NCAA bitch-smack report; in fact, the report made careful references to "the current head coach" rather than "Bob Pruett".
- Pruett, having not been named in the report, coached Marshall for a further three years, not a particularly common occurrence when a school is hit with sanctions.

Now for the speculative garbage, in which I speculate very speculatively about something I know little about. (The lawsuit.)

- Pruett is named in this lawsuit and has been so from the beginning. Why, then, does it take five years to come up with accusations like these? On the surface, they sound particularly damning, as you'd expect when filed by the plaintiff. Ridpath claims the football staff told the players to keep the compliance staff out of the loop. Further, he is suing essentially because his involvement in this blocked his path to becoming an AD himself. So why wasn't this stuff screamed from the rooftops when the lawsuit was filed, let alone before the NCAA came out with their verdict?
- Ridpath's attorneys filed a FOIA request in order to find out the legal expenses Marshall is paying out. To me, this means one of two things: They're looking to find out where Marshall will draw the line and settle rather than fight. Economics, you know: IF A > B, THEN "Settle Lawsuit"; ELSE "Fight Lawsuit In Court". Either that, or they want to know what they're on the hook for if the judge finds their complaint totally baseless. The former is more likely, and perhaps would indicate Ridpath is less about "clearing his name" than chasing the Benjamins.

In any case, the bottom line is this: Worst case, we have to go looking for a new DC. The NCAA cleared us to hire him though; standard procedure would be to check with the NCAA offices to see if Pruett has anything naughty on his record. This having been done, and the record coming back clean, the possibility of sanctions against UVA for hiring a dirty coach (which he probably isn't) is effectively zero. The NCAA, however, long ago considered this case closed, without finding Pruett guilty of any wrongdoing, and their bylaws more or less prohibit opening it back up. This is going to be one of those things that sort of just disappears in the frenzied happenings of the football season, and by Signing Day, we'll have forgotten that we forgot about it.