Penn State University is reeling after receiving their sanctions from the NCAA on Monday and the Big Ten Conference has been negatively affected as well, says The Columbus Dispatch. On Tuesday, Todd Jones wrote that the conference will have to deal with the damage inflicted upon a "pillar of the Big Ten brand" and featured comments made by commissioner Jim Delany. One such comment hinted at the immediate futures of some Nittany Lions.
"We'll take a very close look at the NCAA's declaration about freedom to transfer," Delany said. "Our first inclination is to allow those students to have the most amount of freedom and flexibility if they choose to transfer." That suggests that transfers to other Big Ten schools might be allowed.
In the past, the Big Ten has operated with a rule that if a player chooses to transfer within their conference that the player will have to sit out a year and will lose that year of athletic eligibility. For instance, if a player transfers from Michigan to Ohio State after his freshman year they will sit out a season and begin playing again as a junior.
However, Delany's commments, as Jones says, suggest that the conference would waive that rule and allow the students complete freedom in their pursuit of another school to finish their collegiate football career.
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