The Huskies Win!/ Were Karmically Rewarded for Honestly Reporting their Academic Shortcomings.

During the post-game celebration last night, University of Connecticut point guard Shabazz Napier caused a stir by announcing to the crowd,

"Ladies and gentlemen, you're looking at the hungry Huskies. This is what happens when you ban us. Last year, two years, we worked so hard for it..."

Speak for New England, Shabazz!

Thought his boldness can be written off as empty emotion, what Napier said summarized the anger, and now vindication that the University of Connecticut and its fans have felt in the past two years.

Last year, Connecticut was banned from the NCAA tournament due to its poor Academic Progress Report (APR). This metric aggregates classroom performance and graduation rate amongst a program's athletes to judge whether they're meeting off-court standards.

It was an embarrassment for a state the values education, and a university with a strong academic reputation. 

Connecticut deserved the sanctions. However, those who follow college basketball tend to ignore the deeper implication: The University of Connecticut is an honest when it comes to its athletes.

By now, its an open secret that big-time college basketball programs take advantage of lax regulation and complicit faculty to boost the grades of middling students. In the past month, the University of North Carolina has come under scrutiny following the release of a juvenile, 146-word 'essay' on Rosa Parks, which contributed to one student-athlete receiving an A-minus for an introductory course in African-American Studies. 

In fairness to the NCAA, it did drop the hammer on UNC's football program in 2012. Though the salient violations were for impermissible benefits, they did include one count of academic fraud.

The program was not punished for poor grades; it was punished for lying.

In a twisted way, Connecticut was punished for telling the truth. Rather than create an academically bankrupt program meant to perpetuate the NCAA's myth of the student-athlete, UConn held its players to real collegiate standards. Connecticut does things the right way, even when that means admitting wrongdoing. Its players are real students, and for this reason, it is a worthy champion of college basketball.

Shabazz Napier was hit hard by last year's sanctions, but that frustration fueled him to work harder. One year later, he has a second national championship, and a legitimate degree in Sociology to show for it.