UConn is in Trouble

The other day, UConn's appeal of their issues with the APR, Academic Progress Rate, and will officially not be allowed to participate in the 2013 NCAA Tournament.

This decision is huge for a number of reasons. The first obvious reason is that UConn, who won the National Championship last season and always is a national championship contender, will not be in the tournament. I can't remember the last time a team of this stature was banned from the postseason, particularly for academic reasons.

Then the question of what happens to the program starts to come into questions. Will they be able to recruit? In this age of "one and dones," no big time high school player who only intends on spending one year in the NCAA will waste that year with UConn. Even further than that, who does want to go to the Huskies right now? Who is to say that these issues will be resolved?

With guys who are on the team already, particularly those with only one year of eligibility left, do they want to spend that year at UConn where they can't win a national title? You have to imagine that there will be numerous transfers and decommittals over the next few weeks.

Then there's Jim Calhoun. The legendary coach missed a lot of this past season with medical issues, and his team struggled without him. The Huskies lost 9 of 12 at one point this season, and there were rumblings that the defending national champs may not even make the tournament.

The Huskies only started to get hot once Calhoun came back, leading to a nice run in the Big East tournament before falling in their first tournament game to Iowa State.

Clearly Calhoun is a major part of this program, but with the coach's health declining and his age getting up there, will he even return for next season? It appears that he will, as he has mentioning his goal of winning the Big East regular title.

Just because Calhoun returns next year though means nothing. Jim Calhoun may retire after next season, again, citing health concerns. The legendary Jim Calhoun may have already coached in his last NCAA Tournament game thanks to this ruling.

In the end, it will be fascinating to see how this one year postseason ban will affect the UConn program. Personally, I think they'll be ok, just because I can't see UConn falling off the face of the Earth, but you never know. One year of recruiting hell and the loss of a coach can do programs in, so it will be a situation to watch over these next few years.