TUCSON, AZ- The FBI drama continues for Arizona Basketball, and as head coach Sean Miller is going to be subpoenaed, here’s what that means.
Are you exhausted from the FBI drama? Us too! Just as we thought things were cooling down, alas, they are heating back up as we leaned Arizona head coach Sean Miller will be subpoenaed to testify.
News broke on Monday afternoon, when Yahoo’s Pete Thamel gave us that story.
Arizona Wildcats
Doom and gloomers, please feel free to continue moping, as I’m sure the headline is causing uneasiness among the Wildcat faithful.
However, here’s the truth that I’m sure many are over-looking – believe it or not, the subpoena isn’t all that damning to the program, at least not yet.
What do I mean? Well, without looking at the dictionary, does anyone know what subpoena means? In short, it’s a writ ordering for a person to attend court.
We all knew this was likely going to come, and after former assistant coach Book Richardson took his plea deal, it perhaps should have been evident Miller would have to appear.
However, in a world of mass amounts of misinformation, let’s try to be diligent here, shall we?
As the information of Miller be subpoenaed came forth on Monday afternoon, here’s what we know so far!
- First off, the subpoena isn’t necessarily implicating coach Miller to any new crimes. What has been presented thus far, is what we all know.
- Secondly, it’s not the FBI subpoenaing Miller, it’s former Adidas rep, Christian Dawkins’ attorney.
- Thirdly, he’s not on trial for himself, there’s only so many questions he can be asked, and this certainly isn’t a case of him being charged with anything.
- Lastly, this doesn’t necessarily mean that anything new or damning will indeed come out.
Through the investigation, Miller has maintained his position he took back in February of 2018, and if can recall, here is what Miller had said:
"“I have never knowingly violated NCAA rules while serving as head coach of this great program,” Miller said at the time. “I have never arranged or directed improper payment to a recruit, their family or any representative.“Any reporting to the contrary is inaccurate, false and defamatory. There was no such conversation,” Miller said. “The only attempted corrections (to the report) … are still inaccurate and completely false. … Let me be very, very clear. I have never discussed with Christian Dawkins paying DeAndre Ayton to attend Arizona.”"
Miller deviating from this position when he is called to testify on April 22 is unlikely. Instead, he will be testifying in federal court, providing the granular detail of recruiting in college basketball as per Yahoo.
So at this point, conjecturing and hypothesizing to the contrary of what we just said would be foolish.
Are the optics bad? Of course they are, but this had to have been expected for some time now. Just be patient, let’s see how this plays out and if nothing new comes up, why worry of essentially nothing?
At Zona Zealots, we’re certainly hoping for the best result possible which would mean Miller being fine, but at this point we’re not going to speculate to anything. Bear Down, Arizona!