OT: Authorities Looking Into Hawaii FB Point Shaving
The Associated Press reports
An anonymous letter has raised allegations that University of Hawaii football players are involved in a point-shaving scheme, but police said Tuesday that they don't have enough information to launch an investigation.
University President M.R.C. Greenwood said in a statement that the admissions office received an anonymous letter Nov. 3 that accused unnamed players of intentionally playing poorly to affect the final score as part of a gambling scheme. Officials immediately alerted Honolulu police and the NCAA, the statement said.
The WWL chimes in to note:
NCAA has been in contact with Hawaii since early November regarding point-shaving allegations
November 23rd, 2011 at 12:43 PM ^
Interesting, but from what I have seen of Hawaii, they just aren't very good. Kind of tough to play poorly (and for it to make a difference) when you suck.
November 23rd, 2011 at 12:50 PM ^
It would be easier to point shave if the spread is big. When you're a 35-point underdog and you miss a couple of tackles in the second half of a blowout loss to make sure you don't cover, who's going to notice?
November 23rd, 2011 at 1:24 PM ^
In Toledo's case, the FBI.
November 23rd, 2011 at 12:44 PM ^
What's point-shaving?
November 23rd, 2011 at 1:05 PM ^
I saw this on SVPs twitter and thought he was joking. Guess not.
November 23rd, 2011 at 1:08 PM ^
Point shaving is not easy too hide since the sportsbooks are very sensitive to any irregular betting action.
November 23rd, 2011 at 1:54 PM ^
Did they not believe that they looked tragic enough on the field?
November 23rd, 2011 at 2:13 PM ^
The Hawaii PD statement is that there isn't an active investigation becuase there isn't enough evidence. This does raise a question, though. How come relevant schools don't get accused of point shaving? It always seems like the bottom-feeders and tomato cans who get involved in those kind of scandals.
November 23rd, 2011 at 2:53 PM ^
that smaller schools can be much easier to manipulate the score if you have 1 or 2 players on the take. The point spreads can be larger and thus the team could still 'win' but not cover the spread.
November 23rd, 2011 at 3:46 PM ^
...of what people think constitutes lack of evidence, it'd be hard to ever indict anyone for shaving. The assumption appears to be that if they're shaving points at all they must be doing it consistently in every game--why else would you care about these overall records?
It makes much more sense to me to look at betting patterns in individual games, and not just total amounts but when and where and--to the extent its possible to know--by whom the bets were made. That's how they caught all the soccer stuff last year.
http://www.businessinsider.com/hawaii-football-scandal-2011-11
November 23rd, 2011 at 3:50 PM ^
...mostly involved matches in low-level obscure leagues and friendlies between mis-matched opponents. You don't want to fix a match that lots of people will be watching or will care passionately about the result--that just increases the chances you'll get caught.
November 23rd, 2011 at 3:45 PM ^
This explains the UNLV game.