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West Virginia senators Joe Manchin and Jay Rockefeller promised an investigation on Wednesday into whether Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) tried to influence the Big 12 into inviting Louisville over West Virginia.
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"If these outrageous reports have any merit -- and especially if a United States Senator has done anything inappropriate or unethical to interfere with a decision that the Big 12 had already made -- then I believe that there should be an investigation in the U.S. Senate, and I will fight to get the truth," Manchin said.
Turns out that Manchin might need to investigate himself because according to a report, he and Rockefeller both tried to influence Oklahoma president David Boren to accept West Virginia into the Big 12 -- just like McConnell is accused of doing with Louisville.
CBS Sports reported Thursday that Manchin and Rockefeller had both been in contact with at least Boren before Wednesday's public decrying of McConnell trying to use his influence on the situation. A Manchin representative denied to the IBTimes that the senator had ever been in contact with Boren, though, and said that Manchin "doesn't know" Boren.
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If true, that Rockefeller -- or Manchin if he did it despite the denials -- would come off as extremely hypocritical for publicly blasting McConnell, while privately doing the same thing.
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But should it really shock anyone that a United States senator might be a bit less than truthful?
The mess between the senators serves as an example of the many issues plaguing not only college athletics, but this country in general.
The last thing that college athletics needs is for government officials to start getting involved and sullying up the NCAA even more than it already is.
One could argue that college administrators are idiots and have no idea what they are doing, based on some of these realignment moves; and those people could make a fair argument.
But why would anyone have faith in people that have failed to accomplish a myriad of goals in Washington to suddenly fix the issues in college football?
It makes perfect sense why all three senators would get involved on behalf of their state schools -- millions of dollars of sense, in fact.
A move by either Louisville or West Virginia could be worth as much as an additional $10 million to each school, according to one report. No government official wants to see the home state schools get left in the dust and lose out on a lot of potential money.
But no one cares what Rockefeller, McConnell or any other politician thinks about college realignment. There are plenty of more pressing issues for a United States senator to concern his or herself with than college football.
These senators need to let things play out as they will and let the Big 12 decide on whatever school it feels is the better fit for its conference. It could be Louisville -- that's Oklahoma's preference -- or it could be West Virginia.
