(Update: Andrew Harrison issues public apology to Frank Kaminsky)
You can lose with dignity and class, or you can lose with despicable petulance. Some Kentucky basketball players, including the Harrison twins and Willie Cauley-Stein, took the low road. Andrew Harrison in particular, has severely damaged his individual reputation.
So one of the Harrison twins dropped an N-bomb at Frank Kaminsky under his breath at the live postgame press conference 1/2
— Paul M. Banks (@PaulMBanks) April 5, 2015
Kentucky SID should have apology statement, attributed to Andrew Harrison, released to media by…over/under 11am EST Sunday 2/2
— Paul M. Banks (@PaulMBanks) April 5, 2015
It’s about 12 hours since this incident and no such public apology has been issued by Andrew Harrison yet. Twelve hours may not seem like a lot of time to some of you, but today’s media climate moves in cycles of minutes and hours, not days and weeks.
A USA Today reporter directed a question at Big KAT Karl Anthony-Towns about what makes Frank Kaminsky such a difficult match-up. Andrew Harrison seems to think that covering his mouth will stop the microphone directly below him from picking up and broadcasting what he’s saying.
In the video below, you can hear him say “F**k that N***a;” thereby turning a Final Four postgame press conference into a 2pac album.
It’s been viewed 7,000,000 times and counting. It will be likely be at 8m plus by the time you read this.
If Andrew Harrison declares for the NBA and hits the scouting combine next month, he’ll have some explaining to do during the interview process.
Making the situation more ironic and strange, Kaminsky, who is obviously Caucasian, was asked to describe his team about a year ago, with his response literally being: “White Guys.”
Willie Cauley-Stein, as well as Aaron Harrison and Andrew Harrison, skipped the pretty much mandatory postgame hand shake line last night. That’s a really bad look for them.
Kentucky finished with a record setting 38 victories, exactly one decade after the 2005 Illinois Fighting Illini finished their season with a record setting 37 victories. Both teams ended their season on April 4th, ten years apart, with a loss.
Both teams spent most of the season ranked #1 and entered the NCAA Tournament as the overwhelming favorite. Both teams ended their year with sadness; seeing those 37+ victories actually mean nothing in the end because they didn’t win the title.
So while you could feel some sympathy for Kentucky today, at least theoretically, the way some of the players behaved, especially Andrew Harrison, makes that impossible.
Paul M. Banks owns, operates and writes The Sports Bank.net, which is partnered with Fox Sports Digital. You can read Banks’ feature stories and op-eds in the Chicago Tribune RedEye newspaper and hear his regular guest spots on numerous sports talk radio stations all across the country.
Follow him on Twitter (@paulmbanks)