Last year's basketball buzz around the Harvard campus revolved around Linsanity, as proud Crimson alum Jeremy Lin took the NBA by storm. Heading into the 2012-13 college basketball season, however, the publicity surrounding the program is taking a turn for the worse.
Star basketball player and co-captain Kyle Casey is going to leave school in the wake of a cheating scandal, according to SI.com.
A Harvard athletic department official told FOXSports.com that the portion of the report saying Casey was banned from the team and will leave school is untrue.
In August, Harvard's dean of undergraduate education, Jay Harris, sent out a letter to the students that included the following excerpt:
"I am writing to alert you to deeply disturbing allegations of academic dishonesty involving a significant number of Harvard College students, and to remind you of every student's duty to embrace our ideals regarding, as well as the specific rules governing, academic integrity," it said.
Harvard's administrative board was investigating allegations that about 125 undergraduates "may have committed acts of academic dishonesty, ranging from inappropriate collaboration to outright plagiarism, on a take-home final exam."
SI.com's source claims that Casey and at least one other men's basketball player are among a group of students whose cases are pending review.
The first-team, all-Ivy League forward was to be the team's top returning scorer and rebounder (averaged 11.4 points and 5.5 rebounds as a junior). Casey faces a charge of academic dishonesty that could carry a one-year suspension from Harvard.
Since he would have to enroll in class by Tuesday, Sept. 11, Casey reportedly withdrew from school instead, so he would have a chance at keeping his final year of eligibility.
