Chansky's Notebook: Maryland on the Brink

The mess at Maryland begins and ends at the very top.

University of Maryland President Wallace D. Loh has been known to go off the reservation commenting on college athletics controversies at other schools. Loh made some ill-informed remarks about the academic scandal at UNC, for instance.

Now, Loh is in the middle of his own mess, and it is likely to end up with people getting fired all the way to the president’s office. Shouldn’t the buck stop with the boss in any business or university? Loh sure acts like he’s in charge at Maryland.

A football player for the Terrapins, Jordan McNair, died after suffering a heat stroke during an off-season workout in what sounded like a scene from Bear Bryant and the Junction Boys at the old Texas A&M. McNair never recovered after his body temperature rose to 106, and the football program has been in the crosshairs ever since.

Loh recently declared that Maryland accepts “moral and legal responsibility” for the mistakes made by its athletic training staff at the workout on May 29 that ultimately led to the death of the 19-year-old McNair, an offensive lineman. Loh said Maryland staffers did not take McNair’s temperature at the workout, did not apply a cold-water immersion treatment and did not follow the emergency response plan appropriately.

Since then, football coach DJ Durkin and three members of his training staff were placed on administrative leave pending the completion of an investigation into not only McNair’s death but the conduct of the entire football program. Former and current players have said Durkin ran an abusive operation, using demeaning language and actions that should never be tolerated.

Maryland left the ACC in 2014 to join the Big Ten because its athletic department was sinking in debt. The Big Ten, which distributes more TV money to each school than any other conference, thought it was getting the lucrative TV market of Washington and Baltimore. What it got was more headaches to go with controversies at several other conference members.

Durkin and athletic director Damon Evans both came from the Midwest, where they were supposed to know the principles upon which the Big Ten operates. Among them is that the presidents really run the athletic departments.

That is bad news for Wallace Loh, who will also be gone when the dust settles in College Park.