Report: SMU frosh Keith Frazier had failing grade changed as HS senior

[alp227]

It's been over 25 years since the NCAA issued the "death penalty" to Southern Methodist University football. Now SMU is in hot water again, because a star basketball player might have had an improper grade change so that he could graduate from high school:

When Keith Frazier committed to SMU as a high school senior, it was considered a huge coup for the Mustangs. Frazier was a top-50 recruit, and had five-star ability as a scorer. According to a report, though, there is some question whether Frazier should have been able to graduate from Kimball High School in Texas.

Frazier had at least one failing grade changed to passing, according to an internal investigation by the Dallas Independent School District. WFAA, an ABC affiliate in Texas, is reporting the news.

According to a DISD audit report obtained by WFAA, Frazier was behind in, or failing, at least three classes in the final days of school in 2013. The report also found that Frazier did not have the necessary class hours to graduate.

His NCAA eligibility was in jeopardy, investigators said.

On May 29, a week after the final days of class for seniors, Frazier's "failing" grade in physics was mysteriously changed to "passing," the report states.

According to the report, Kimball soccer coach and teacher's assistant Demarco King improperly pressured Frazier's physics teacher to change Frazier's grade. When the teacher refused, King admitted to investigators that he changed the grade himself.

This isn't the first time Frazier got in trouble. WFAA reported in May 2012:

For the first three months of the 2011-2012 school year, Frazier lived at a house in Irving and was destined to be a star player for the Irving Tigers.

But in early November of last year, Frazier and his family picked up and moved out of the Irving residence where they'd lived for three years.

Days later, Frazier enrolled at Kimball, rated by the state as an "academically unacceptable" high school in south central Dallas.

But before he could play basketball for Kimball, Frazier's transfer had to be approved by the Dallas ISD's District 11 4-A executive committee, made up of representatives of each school in Kimball's district.

The key question asked by the committee: Did Frazier move so he could play basketball for the reigning state champs? To do that would be a violation of state high school basketball rules prohibiting players for moving for "athletic purposes."

SMU has already issued a response to WFAA's report. By the way, WFAA is the same TV station that broke the news of SMU's mid-1980s violations that led to the NCAA death penalty.

DallasNews.com now reports: "Dallas ISD investigators are considering a review of district programs that have helped thousands of struggling seniors graduate after a separate investigation found that a top basketball recruit’s grades were improperly changed."

[IllinoisBirdWatcher]

1. Amazing. The news reports seem to have the same facts.

The carefully-worded SMU response sure reads as an incredibly self-serving spin.