It was a rough year for Iowa State guard Kerwin Okoro last season. What happened on the court paled in comparison to what happened off it, as he lost his brother to cancer, as well as his father last season. It must have been a difficult year for anyone to endure.
Okoro, a New York City native, requested a transfer (with immediate eligibility) to Rutgers this season in order to be closer to his family. However that transfer request was denied by the NCAA. According to the NCAA transfer guidelines, a player who is moving closer to home to be closer to a sick family member is allowed such a transfer (with immediate eligibility), but there is no such provision available for an athlete who has suffered a death in his immediate family.
Okoro appealed the decision, and his move found much support from fans and media around the country. In this instance it seemed that the public pressure has worked as the NCAA has agreed with the appeal and granted him immediate eligibility at Rutgers.
“The committee, when they reexamined this as a part of their regular review of the directives and the guidelines, made a revision and then said, ‘OK, staff. In this kind of an instance, moving forward, we’re going to establish a new guideline for you to approve these,'” NCAA’s vice president of academic and membership affairs, Kevin Lennon said. “And that’s what happened. … This is an instance where the committee, in its authority as a membership body, said ‘We now want you to look at these kinds of cases differently.’ … So if somebody transfers after the death of an immediate family member, now the staff is armed with guidelines from the committee that says, ‘We want you to look at this differently.’ That’s the guideline moving forward.”
The decision means that NCAA transfer regulations are now being re-written for other student athletes who face the same situation, and wish to transfer to a school closer to home. In fact Drew Wilson who played for Missouri State last season, and transferred to Oral Roberts after the death of his sister, has also had his waiver request approved, after it was initially denied by the NCAA.
We at LWOS applaud Okoro and Wilson for taking on the system, and applaud the NCAA for making the right decision in this case. We hope that this helps them and their families in the difficult healing process that they are going through.
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