I have a hard time believing Huggins would have dished out any cash to those in Mayo’s inner circle. For one, he already had the other big name from that year’s recruiting class in Mike Beasley, so he didn’t necessarily need another high-profile recruit. Secondly, Tim Floyd is just that type of person. There was an article in The New York Times (if I remember correctly) that played out the whole process of how Guillory contacted Floyd and essentialy played the part of an agent for Mayo. The article made it sound like Floyd would have done anything to land the kid, and he basically just let Guillory call the shots during the whole recruitment. In summary, Tim Floyd is a door mat, and he was desperate to turn USC basketball into the type of high-profile program that USC football is. He needed a big name. Guillory provided that big name. Tim Floyd provided Guillory cash.

One other funny thing. Listening to Dan Patrick this morning, he said he was surprised the dollar amount was so low. “What is that per game, like 35 bucks? That’s it?”

Made me lol.

I have to believe it would take flagrant, ridiculous violations to get the death penalty these days. The NCAA saw the destruction it caused in Dallas with what it did to SMU, and I don’t think they’ll impose that penalty lightly again.

As I understand it, one of the biggest problems the NCAA is having with the USC investigation is that they can’t force anyone to talk to them. They’re not police or prosecutors, so they don’t have the ability to require anyone, under penalty of a visit to jail, to give them information. So they get initial information from these disgruntled former insiders, but then there’s nothing to back it up because nobody else will cooperate. Of course, given that it’s USC, the NCAA may not be working as hard as possible to turn anything up, hoping they can just brush this aside as a disgruntled former insider spreading lies, thus not having to hope that Rick Neuheisel can get it turned around at UCLA so they have a powerhouse football program in the second-largest city in the country.