Facebook and the recruitment of John Wall

I don’t think there’s any argument that UK fans are more hands on with their basketball program than probably any other fan base in the country. We feel like a part of the program and we want to do everything we can to help it succeed.

With that, we pretty consistently blur the line between “fan” and “recruiter” when it comes to high school kids who are thinking about UK for their college career. It happened plenty before the advent of the internet, but with the popularity of Facebook and message boards, UK fans get the University in trouble from time to time.

It’s good to know that we aren’t the only ones! The Cleveland Plain Dealer (which is my favorite name for a newspaper by the way) published an article today about the wooing of John Wall by every school he’s interested in, as well as those schools’ fans. Here’s a slightly out of context excerpt that mentions UK, but the rest is worth a read:

The NCAA made clear to N.C. State that it considers such sites a violation, Lee said. Making such a public appeal to Wall, in effect, turned Moseley into a representative of the university’s athletic interests under NCAA Division I bylaw 13.02.13.

NCAA spokesman Erik Christianson said the bylaw applies to “individuals who would develop a social networking site or use an existing one to send recruiting messages to prospective student-athletes. Those communications are not allowed and are considered violations.”

As to whether 13.02.13 trumps the First Amendment, “I think that comes up, but the institution has an obligation to say, ‘For us to be a member of the association, we have to follow NCAA rules,’” said Shane Lyons, the ACC’s associate commissioner for compliance.

N.C. State fans are hardly the only ones courting Wall on Facebook.

One search turned up five such groups ? “Memphis Wants John Jimmy Wall”; “Bring John Wall to Baylor”; “John Wall in Memphis Dynasty”; “John Wall, come to DUKE!”; “John Wall Belongs at UNC” ? along with several dedicated to persuading Wall to attend the University of Kentucky.

Micah Pearson, creator of the “Kentucky needs John Wall!” Facebook group said he believes the sites affect players’ decisions.

“I have heard numerous players make comments about how crazy the UK fan base is,” said Pearson, whose Facebook group had 1,738 members as of Thursday afternoon.

Those members included Wall himself, according to Pearson.

CHECK OUT THE FULL ARTICLE