Big East signed off on those suspensions too, so it won't increase.

Here's the early report on ESPN in terms of Xavier suspensions, they have a press conference set for like 4:15 or 4:30.

This rivalry is poisoned - interesting post from the XU fan forum:

"When Ohio State blew out Michigan one year Woody Hayes went for two after a touchdown late in the game with the game already decided. This prompted one of my favorite quotes in all of sport:

Press: Why did you go for two?

Woody Hayes: Because I couldn't go for three.

They beat us by 20 last year and they ran the score up late trash talking all the way. Now they complain about our trash talking, despite how much crap that has come out of their mouths over the decades.

Why did we go for 2?
Because we couldn't go for 3.

I wish we would have pulled the starters now, but at the time I wasn't saying "Pull the Starters!" Garvin called me out for that on the other thread and it is true. At the time I wanted to beat them by 20 or more. I still had a taste of last year and I wanted to crush them. I wanted more. I wanted not just to defeat them but to break their will. I wanted to humiliate them. I wanted to show them who is boss.

Now is hindsight it is easy to say what Chris Mack should have done, but at the time I wanted it all and I wanted it now. If you were at the game you probably didn't hear anyone in blue complain that we kept their starters in. They kept their starters in last night. They kept their starters in last year and continued to run it up. They can't handle it when the shoe is on the other foot.

Let Mick take his thugs out first."

Sadly, a lot of the Xavier fans and alumni I've talked to, read about, or saw on the news are backing their guys on this one like it was warranted. They're really upset that Gates isn't gone for the year, which they should be. However, I don't see how you can look at this situation and think Xavier doesn't bare any blame.

The thing that people are failing to realize is that this rivalry has been heated for a number of years, and it's most recently escalated in the past couple. Two years ago when Xavier won an amazing game in 2OT, Bearcats guard Lance Stephenson challenged Xavier coach Chris Mack and a fight almost broke out in the one too. I wouldn't be surprised if they move this series downtown to US Bank Arena for a netural site game from now on. Who the hell knows how UC might retaliate next season when it moves over to Clifton?

What were the penalties around the Behagan stomp?

suspended for the rest of the year............

I tend to disagree with some on this board.  I would say that NOW both XU and UC are recruiting the "thug" types.  Didn't you hear TU's explanation of "gangstas" in the locker room.  That tells me what XU has become with their recent success.  Having seen videos, it is obvious that the XU guy started the physical altercations by pushing a UC guy do0wn.  The rest was just a bunch of kids reverting back to their play ground roots.

Not saying UC doesn't have some blame too.  Obviously, whoever wins this game gets bragging rights and top trash mouth postings.  I'm sure they are equally bad in that regard.

I would close by saying it was obvous the UC folks took this more serious as their suspensions were longer.  Why did the X guys get 4 and not 6?  As for TU and his "trash" and  "gangsta" talk...he only got one game.  and, have you ever heard him in a presser...yikes!?!? 

       Could the difference in length of suspensions between the two teams have anything to do with the difference in potential success this year for both teams? In other words, doesn't X have more to lose?

Just heard that a prosecutor in Cincinnati is considering criminal charges of disorderly conduct and assault against some of the perps here.  IMHO, this kind of action is warranted.  There are a few precedents of criminal charges against those involved in sports fights. I think that kind of action would help send a message to these thug types that they aren't something real special just because they are gifted athletes.  They ain't above the law.

If nothing else, the putting the fear of prosecution into them could be a worthwhile endeavor.

Sometimes, what you see isn't what you think as far as a person's personality is concerned.

One of the most famous sucker punches of all times:

You have to be pretty long in the tooth to remember Kermit Washington slugging Rudy Tomjanovich but if you saw it, you most  certainly thought you knew the story.  Maybe you didn't.  If you didn't see it, check about 1:55 into the clip.  It is still one of the most horrific on court incidents I've seen, including XU - UC and OSU - Minnesota, among others.

I well remember all those incidents.  Long in tooth, indeed.

About this Holloway guy ...

I swear, sometimes it seems as though every time you think you might smell a rat, you dig in and find ... rats!

Terrell Holloway came from New York to Cincinnati in 2008 for his senior year of high school. Where would he study and play ball? At Harmony Community School, which was located in one of the ugliest and least healthy places you could possibly put a school - literally in the shadow of 18-wheeler-infested Interstate 75 and on the banks of the famously polluted Mill Creek.

One can hazard a guess that Holloway chose this school because it was a pipeline to a big-time scholarship that had minimal academic requirements. Harmony Community School's principal and executive director when Holloway arrived was former Miami University and NFL running back Deland McCullough. The former Redhawk star "was responsible for the placement of over 100 student-athletes into college on scholarships" during his stint as the school's football coach and athletics director, according to McCullough's bio at Indiana University, where he's now an assistant coach. This was at a school with a small total enrollment of, as best as I can tell, fewer than 1000 students at its peak. 

Holloway was a Kelvin Sampson recruit at Indiana who committed to Xavier after the house fell down in Bloomington. But the rest of the story about Harmony Community School, in my opinion, calls into question the qualifications and eligibility of anyone who worked or graduated from there. It also might go a long way toward explaining the entitled, ego-driven mentality that Holloway displays.

By 2007, the Cincinnati press was closing in, detailing how Harmony Community School was bringing in out-of-state athletes, housing them in below-market-rent apartments, fabricating employment documents to get them Ohio residency and then getting state taxpayer money to pay their tuition at the charter school.

www.local12.com/news/local/story/Harmony-Schools-Athletic-Residency-Questioned/KuRYfVZ_REGDx4z6r8LnSw.cspx 

In the middle of Holloway's senior year, the Ohio Attorney General filed suit against the school, charging it with "abject academic failure, gross financial mismanagement, ethical lapses, and what amounts to consumer fraud."

news.google.com/newspapers (Youngstown Vindicator)

www.dispatch.com/content/stories/local/2008/01/18/dann.html

The school closed later in 2008.

Then you go back and see a 2005 Scout.com article about how Harmony "aims to become national power" in basketball. Then you Google the school's former coach, Travis McAvene ...

ohiostate.scout.com/a.z

A picture emerges, and it's one that I hope Bobcat basketball stays away from.