Headlinin’: NCAA finally cracks down on … Arkansas State

Making the morning rounds.

? We got those punks, O'Malley. We finally got 'em. Arkansas State will vacate 10 football wins from the 2005 and 2006 seasons as part of a broader penance for playing 31 academically ineligible athletes in four sports from 2005-08. ASU offered to forget the games itself after discovering in an internal audit that the athletes failed to meet progress-toward-degree requirements due to, essentially, bad advice by the school's academic staff. That would usually be considered a secondary violation, but was upgraded to "major" status by the NCAA for the unusually large number of players involved, and also elicited a reprimand, censure and $43,500 fine in 2009. In football, the self-imposed sanctions wipe out six wins from 2005, when ASU shared the Sun Belt championship and represented the conference in the New Orleans Bowl —�the only bowl game in school history — and four wins in 2006.

In case you're keeping score, victories incurred while fielding a player whose father solicited money during his recruitment or who sold memorabilia to a drug-dealing tattoo parlor or who accepted benefits from agents through as assistant coach are still on the books — as is Jerry Tarkanian's old joke about Cleveland State. [Associated Press]

? Song of Seantrel. Left tackle Seantrel Henderson, 6-foot-8, 345-pound gem of the 2010 recruiting class, said Saturday he has no intention of transferring from Miami before his sophomore season, but his status remains in some doubt after coach Al Golden remained silent Friday on a report that Henderson had been suspended for the Hurricanes' season opener at Maryland. "Seantrel has every intention of remaining with the University of Miami and our football program," Golden said in a statement. "He is coming off a strong finish to offseason workouts, rotated with the first team on Thursday and is well respected and liked by his teammates." Henderson started eight games and was named a freshman All-American last year, but began the spring as one of several starters demoted to the second team or left off the depth chart altogether as part of the new coaching staff's war on entitlement. [South Florida Sun-Sentinel, Miami Herald]

? Welcome back, eventually. There's no such doubt for North Carolina cornerback Charles Brown, a 2009 All-ACC pick who missed all of 2010 as part of the great Tar Heel reckoning and will also have to sit out UNC's season opener against James Madison this September before he's eligible to take the field again. Brown was one of seven Carolina players who missed the entire season for one NCAA infraction or another, in his case for accepting $86.94 from "someone identified as a prospective agent." He'll also have to pay the money back before his return. [Associated Press]

? No, no. We got this. A few weeks back, we learned UConn took a $1.8 million bath on the biggest game in school history last December, almost entirely due to the cost of eating unsold tickets. As it turns out, the Huskies' Fiesta Bowl foil, Oklahoma, didn't fare much better on the ticket front, selling just a little over 5,000 of the 17,500 seats it was required to buy from the game at face value. But OU came out way ahead financially, thanks to the Big 12, which helpfully absorbed more than $1.8 million in costs for vast majority of the tickets (10,403 to be exact) that the university couldn't move. With the conference's help, the Sooners actually turned a $9,350 profit. [Hartford Courant]

? Happy trails. Northern Illinois is losing a pair of returning defensive starters next fall to unexpected circumstances: Linebacker Tyrone Clark, voted the team's defensive MVP last year, is leaving due to an undisclosed "personal situation," and safety Tracy Wilson has decided to forego his senior season to "pursue professional football opportunities" — i.e. throw his name into the NFL's supplemental draft, or just show up in a training camp this summer and, I don't know, catch on as a replacement player? [DeKalb Daily Chronicle]

Quickly… The NCAA's official blogger calls Yahoo's reportorial angels of death "almost supernaturally good" at doing the job of NCAA investigators. … Indiana's Occupational Health and Safety Administration will release the results of its investigation into the death of Notre Dame student videographer Declan Sullivan on Tuesday. … Converted cornerback Aaron Colvin could make or break Oklahoma's secondary as the Sooners' new strong safety. … Colorado's spring practice has included a dramatic rise in "the decibel level and number of four-letter words" under the new coaching staff. … Yet another USC defensive lineman is is Bo Pelini smiling after Nebraska's first spring practice? … Washington fans are perfectly fine with keeping Jake Locker in Seattle. … Tyrone Willingham, "one of the most respected names in college football," is elected to the board of directors of a bowl game. … Miami probably doesn't have to worry about its latest quarterback commitment following through. … J.B. Shugarts tweets in tongues. … And the old Cleveland Bulldogs win the all-time uniform competition, and it's not even close.

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Matt Hinton is on Twitter: Follow him @DrSaturday.

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