The school year and college football season has arrived.
Parties, Saturday night games and nightlife will all start out as fun and games but will end in trouble for some.
A notable amount of collegiate football players were suspended for their first game of the season, including three ASU players.
Jamal Miles, a senior wide receiver for the program, was suspended for the first game of the season due to failure to meet team standards. Miles’ suspension was said to be for undisclosed reasons, dating back to last year when he was suspended for the Las Vegas Bowl.
Coach Todd Graham sent a message to the Sun Devil football program before they even took the field against NAU. A bold move by Graham to suspend three players did not interfere with the game though, as the Sun Devils cruised to a 63-6 victory.
Graham recently announced in this video that the three players would return to play in week two against Illinois. Graham also noted that, “the hardest thing to do is to get a football team up to play 14 games - and you’re only guaranteed 12.”
It may not have been the riskiest move since we had FCS opponent NAU for week one opponents, but Coach Graham showed his team that he means business.
Graham went on to say: “At the end of the day, I think our team looked and said, 'Wow, coach is going to hold one of the best players on our team accountable (for)...' I don't want to say it's not major, but probably somewhere else it wouldn't be anything. I think that shows our players (that) our standard is different.”
On other campuses across the nation, many other players have been cited week one suspensions by their teams, due to personal reason or team conduct policy.
The University of Michigan’s running back, Fitz Toussaint, was suspended for his team’s first game against the University of Alabama. Toussaint pleaded guilty to operating a vehicle while visually impaired, a reduced charge of his drunk driving arrest in July.
Michigan did not play a FCS opponent, however they did play arguably the most mature and best team in the country.
Alabama went on to win 41-14, and the eighth ranked Michigan team fell to the 19th rank in the AP polls.
Mistakes will cost you.
It just so happened that in Jamal Miles’ case, ASU was playing FCS team NAU. This is while Fitz Toussaint’s Wolverines had to open the season with second ranked Alabama. The mistakes were then put on two different tiers.
Of course Toussaint’s arrest was news that no one wanted to hear. Whatever Jamal Miles got suspended for, hopefully he is working to get back to the form he was last year. However, the fact of the matter is that timely mistakes cause missed opportunities, and Jamal Miles sure doesn’t want to miss out anymore.
You can reach me at etrianta@asu.edu
