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this latest statement has done nothing to change them. So why bother? Because, the board "has been asked by members of the Penn State community, including stu- dents, faculty, staff and alumni, to state clearly its reasons for the diffi- cult decisions that were made unanimously on the evening of Nov. 9, 2011 – to remove Graham Spanier as president of the University and Joe Paterno as head football coach for the remaining three games of the 2011 season. Our decisions were guided by our obligation as Trustees, always, to put the interests of the University first." Unfortunately for the university, the March 12 statement served to confirm just the opposite: that the trustees' decisions were – and con- tinue to be – guided by their own interests. Namely, defending them- selves. Two months ago, members of the board of trustees sat down for an extensive interview with The New York Times in which they explained their rationale for firing Paterno. The story was front-page news and generated national head- lines. It indicated that after the board decided to remove Spanier as presi- dent the night of Nov. 9, "the ten- sion in the room mounted," with Paterno's fate on the agenda. No one objected after the agreement to fire Paterno was reached, the story read. Additionally, the story detailed the board's belief that Paterno had "failed in not reporting to the police what he had been told of Sandusky's suspected assault" and that Paterno's knowledge "of the nature of the suspected 2002 assault, which he stated in his grand jury testimony, was enough for some to decide that he had not acted appropriately in simply informing the university's athletic director, Tim Curley, and another top official, Gary Schultz." The new statement didn't pro- vide much if any elaboration. It simply repeated the assertion that board members had already made in the Times, stating the follow- ing: "Our most important reason – by far – for this difficult decision flowed from what we learned on Nov. 5, for the first time, from a 'presentment' (report) by a Pennsylvania Grand Jury about Coach Paterno's early 2011 sworn testimony." Unsurprisingly, Paterno's family fired back in a matter of hours with a statement that only intensified the completely avoidable mael- strom. "The Paterno family is surprised and saddened that the Board of Trustees believes it is necessary and appropriate to explain – for the fourth or fifth time – why they fired Joe Paterno so suddenly and unjus- tifiably on Nov. 9, 2011," the state- ment read. "The latest statement is yet another attempt by the board to deflect criticism of their leadership by trying to focus the blame on Joe Paterno. This is not fair to Joe's legacy; it is not consistent with the facts; and it does not serve the best interests of the uni- versity. The board's latest state- ment reaffirms that they did not conduct a thorough investigation of their own and engaged in a rush to judgment." Though the Paternos' response has its own set of debatable points, their decision to issue a statement to the public defending the Nittany Lions' longtime coach was not with- out warrant after the board's action. Save for the plan to name Paterno head coach emeritus – a move that only undermines the view that the coach's response was morally objec- tionable – the new statement consti- tuted yet another failure of leader- ship. While the Penn State community begged for an assertion of leader- ship in early November, the board stayed silent. Now, as the Penn State community attempts to move on from the Jerry Sandusky scan- dal, the board is picking at the scabs. Rather than deflecting attention away from its own obvious mis- steps throughout the scandal, the board's recent actions deflate any hope that the "strong, courageous, honest leadership" identified in the Paternos' response has been found. W W W . B L U E W H I T E O N L I N E . C O M QUOTES T H E W E E K I N . . . BLOGS Breneman is a known commodity around the country, and is good friends with many top recruits in the country. Along with Christian Hackenberg, the Penn State recruiting effort just gained its two best recruiters. To prove that point in almost immediate fashion, Alex Anzalone told me just moments before The Decision, "[Breneman] said once he commits he's gonna recruit the heck outta me." Adam Breneman, already doing work JEFF JUNSTROM BLACK SHOE DIARIES OPINIONS It's early, but O'Brien deserves an A-plus for the job he's done thus far only two months into the job. His staff deserves credit, too, for getting out on the road while O'Brien was still fulfilling his obligations to the Patriots during the NFL playoffs and Super Bowl. While Penn State's 2012 recruiting class, splintered by the fallout from the Jerry Sandusky scandal, left something to be desired in terms of big-name talent, the 2013 class, the one on which O'Brien's skills as a recruiter will ultimately be judged, is off to a solid start. BILL LANDIS THE (CARLISLE) SENTINEL There's never been anything like the past eight weeks of Penn State football. Unless you are talking about the nine weeks before that. Revelation, consternation, transforma- tion. In total, there's been 17 weeks of it – only a third of a year. But, really, it's been a life and a lifetime. MIKE POORMAN STATECOLLEGE.COM For Still, most of the hard work is over – at least until his name is called in April. He knows he'll wind up in someone's camp this summer, only after he and his agent — Drew Rosenhaus – work out a handsome contract, the same thing Odrick did two years ago. For Evans, or Green, or Daryll Clark, the former quarterback who threw passes for the Penn State receivers Wednesday, there are no such certainties, only a hope that all the work they've done, in college and beyond, will one day pay off. Penn State men's basketball hasn't much of a legacy. But what little it does possess is largely due to a 1991 group that broke ground not cracked in over a quarter century. They'll bury the single most important cog in that team this weekend, way before his time. Monroe "Monnie" Brown died Friday at 41. JEFF RICE CENTRE DAILY TIMES DAVID JONES THE (HARRISBURG) PATRIOT-NEWS It's just like any other wrestling, just this one has a title on it. It's just called nationals. It doesn't mean I'm going to go out and wrestle a coach. I'm not going to wrestle a fire- breathing dragon. It's just a person. ED RUTH, TO THE CENTRE DAILY TIMES, AFTER PINNING MISSOURI'S DORIAN HENDERSON AT NCAAS A P R I L 1 1 , 2 0 1 2 7

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