USC loses Williams
LOS ANGELES — The NCAA refused to reinstate Southern California All-American Mike Williams on Thursday, leaving the star wide receiver unable to rejoin the top-ranked Trojans after being shut out of the NFL draft by the courts.
“I’m glad it’s over. Now the team can move forward and I can move forward,” Williams said in a telephone interview. “I’m disappointed. I did everything asked of me. I don’t know yet what I’m going to do. I’ll just relax for the weekend and watch the game and root for my team.”
The ruling came down shortly before the Trojans boarded an airplane for Baltimore. They open defense of their national championship Saturday night against Virginia Tech at FedEx Field in Landover, Md.
USC vice president and legal counsel Todd Dickey said while the ruling could be appealed, the matter was closed.
“At this point, we don’t believe it would be useful to go through those processes,” he said. “We think the NCAA has firmly made up its mind.”
Williams agreed, saying: “I’m kind of done with it right now.”
USC coach Pete Carroll reacted angrily to the ruling and its timing.
“It’s very cold and insensitive for them to deny him this opportunity,” Carroll said. “I’m not surprised by it, but I’m disappointed for Mike and his family. You’ll have to go and ask the NCAA for answers, how they can turn someone down who is otherwise academically eligible.”
The school had applied to the NCAA for a progress-toward-degree waiver and reinstatement of Williams’ eligibility.
Williams caught 95 passes for 1,314 yards and a school-record 16 touchdowns as a sophomore last season to help the Trojans (12-1) win the national championship. The 20-year-old Williams, a sure-handed 6-foot-5, 230-pounder, finished eighth in the Heisman Trophy balloting.
After a court ruled last winter that Ohio State’s Maurice Clarett was eligible to play in the NFL, Williams left USC, hired an agent and said he was turning pro. That made him ineligible to play for the Trojans.
Williams was projected as a high first-round draft pick, but on May 24, an appeals court overturned the earlier ruling and upheld the NFL’s right to bar players who had been out of high school for less than three years.
Williams has been out of high school less than three years, as has Clarett, who was suspended last season after starring at Ohio State as a freshman.
After the appeals court ruling, Williams severed ties with his agent and began the process of applying to the NCAA for reinstatement.
He returned to USC and took summer classes, seeking to have his academic eligibility also restored. It was all for naught.
Two NCAA committees each considered separate issues. One was academics-related — whether Williams has made sufficient progress toward a degree. The other was whether he had returned all benefits provided him by his agent and endorsements.
Williams claimed he had documented the return of all such benefits.