Let me put it more succinctly: UNC became massively corrupt gradually...because they know what we know. They learned that no one will hold them responsible. Not their Trustees or alumni or fans. Not the media (nationally). Not Espn. Not Dookie Vitale and the other Talking Heads.
And most of all, not the NCAA...the supposed whistleblowers. How did this develop? It sure as heck isn't something UNC manufactured. It originated with the NCAA, who (for a variety of reasons) has refused to hold them accountable as they do the rest of us. Other than football, it's been "anything goes" in Chapel Hill.
Thank the Lord that NC State fans + Raleigh News Observer (Dan Kane) seized the day and refused to back down.
Good point. Everyone recognizes that UNC is to blame for the fraud, but the NCAA most certainly helped to facilitate it to occur through their inactions.
I remember from the early 1990's seeing example after example of Michael Jordan and others 'bumping' into recruits both in Chapel Hill and outside, and regardless of whether it was an official visit or not, with nothing happening.
As a UK fan who had just seen UK be nailed for taking a recruit to see Dan Issel on an official recruiting visit (the reason UK was nailed was because Issel happened to live outside of the city of Lexington), it was hard to stomach the blatant flaunting of rules by UNC, yet that's exactly what they did and they knew the NCAA would never lift a finger.
FWIW, I was shocked a few years ago when UNC's Steve Kirshner self-reported a violation of a recruit bumping into such an alum. The reason I was shocked is that they had been doing this for decades with no sign of thinking it was a problem before.
Another example, when Bill Guthridge stepped down but before Matt Doherty took over, there was a time during the summer when there literally was no official basketball staff in place in Chapel Hill. Yet there were a lot of recruits, including David Lee, who were in Chapel Hill at the time, playing with former UNC players who had returned from the NBA and tooling around in their cars, hanging out etc.
I always wondered what, if any, oversight was taking place by the UNC basketball staff (if there even was one) at the time to make sure no violations were taking place. But again, they obviously felt like this was not a problem because they thought they were above the rules. And for that, the NCAA is partially to blame as they allowed such an attitude to take root.
