Kansas State learns basic PR, releases Leticia Romero

When Kansas State women’s basketball player Leticia Romero indicated that she would transfer, the university denied her release. Right or wrong, that’s par for the course in college athletics, but Romero’s case seemed particularly ridiculous.

Romero starred in her freshman season at Kansas State, but after coach Deb Patterson was fired, she decided she wanted to transfer. She’s from the Canary Islands and didn’t feel that she had as close-knit of an environment so far away from home that she did when Patterson was there.

It seemed like a reasonable request, but Kansas State denied her petition to transfer to 94 different schools. The only school that was an option was Middle Tennessee State, and that was because of a “clerical error.” Usually, schools will not allow players to transfer within the conference, and in extreme circumstances, other schools are added. However, Kansas State’s incredible abuse of the NCAA’s transfer policy — one that already has a lot of flaws — in order to keep a non-revenue sport athlete from transferring was perplexing. What’s even more ironic is that if Romero had broken the law and been kicked out of school, as some have pointed out, it would have been easier for her to transfer.

The Wildcats’ athletic department continued their PR nightmare even as calls from prominent sports personalities — including Jay Bilas, Joe Posnanski and Dick Vitale — pressured them to change their minds, but for awhile, they refused to budge.

Finally, after more than a month of the saga, Kansas State decided the bad PR it was receiving over stubbornly refusing to let Romero leave was not actually worth it. The Wildcats released her to any non-Big 12 school. The move was due in part to a new provision in the transfer process that was recommended by AD John Currie to president Kirk Schulz and adopted Tuesday morning:

Now Romero can go where she wants and Kansas State can get out of the spotlight as the current example of what’s wrong with the NCAA. This really shouldn’t have been that hard from the start.