It’s no secret that in NCAA sports, athletes are relatively powerless once they sign with a school. So when athletes transfer, they’re often barred from going to certain schools that the institution they came from might feel threatened by. Most of these bans are unreasonable, and then there’s Louisiana Tech, which has reportedly banned Xavian Stapleton from transferring to 55 different schools.
Louisiana Tech bans basketball player from 55 schools
This seems like a measured response to news of a transfer.
Derik Hamilton-USA TODAY Sports
“We are granting Mr. Stapleton a release to attend any institution not a member of C-USA, not on Louisiana Tech’s 2015-16 schedule, not located in the states of Louisiana, Texas, Mississippi and Arkansas and not the University of Florida.”
There are a couple fun things going on here. The first is that Louisiana Tech might have set a new precedent by banning a player from STATES, not just schools. They didn’t even take the time to decide where they didn’t want him to go; they just wiped out a whole region.
Second, while banning future opponents is still unnecessary, at least it makes sense. Louisiana Tech went beyond anything that could possibly make sense, banning other schools it’s not even playing just out of spite. Florida is banned, because La. Tech is jealous and doesn’t want to let Stapleton play for former coach Mike White. The others are banned for literally no rational reason.
The best part is the school claims they’re doing the right thing.
“I tried to reach out to Coach Konkol after Xavian told him that he wanted to leave,” (Stapleton’s stepmother) said. “He said ‘OK, I’m not going to hold him hostage. Of course I want him to stay, but I’m not going to hold him hostage.’”
To our knowledge, this is the biggest transfer ban list since Mike Gundy banned Wes Lunt from transferring to 37 different schools. Stapleton started one game in 2014-15.
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