BY NORM D. GUERRE JAN. 6, 2015
RALEIGH – The Atlantic Coast Conference announced Monday a decisive step to broaden its geographic and economic footprint by officially inviting the Taliban to join the league.
“I don’t think there’s out there a better situation than what we have achieved,” Mohammed Omar, founder and CEO of the Taliban reported. “The ACC has allowed us to retain a tradition [of violent independence] that’s so central to our identity while we’re joining a conference that athletically as well as academically fits the Taliban perfectly.”
Taliban Athletic Director Sami ul Haq seen giving an interview in front of his student-athletes.
A major domino effect is expected with ISIL and Al-Qaeda switching conferences to the Big East, while the Big Twelve may extend a bid to the Occupy Wall Street movement. Also, Brownie Troop 37 (Greenville) is expected to receive a bid from Conference USA in the coming week.
Although universities voting to extend the bid were the majority, two Tobacco Road schools voted against expansion. UNC-Chapel Hill voted “no” and offered an alternative bid to the like-minded Moral Monday Movement. UNC-CH chancellor Carol Folt voiced concerns about scheduling and the Taliban’s academic record in its madrassas.
Folt said in a statement issued late Tuesday, “C’mon, half the classes they’ve got in those madrassas are no-show classes where they only have to turn in one paper and mock-arm one mortar, not even a live one. And did you see that CNN report? Seven to eighteen percent of their athletes can only read at an elementary school level!”
North Carolina State University also voted against extending a bid to the Taliban. NCSU chancellor Randy Woodson voiced concerns over travel and missed classes. However, it is widely speculated that Woodson has voted “no” in hopes that the ACC may extend an invitation to more athletically competitive rivals geographically nearby. Long in the shadows of its Tobacco Road rivals, NCSU may be hoping an invitation will be extended to the Governor Morehead School on Western Blvd., near NCSU’s main campus.
At a press conference held after the announcement, ACC Commissioner John Swofford responded to criticism, saying, “What? There’s nothing wrong extending a bid to an academically and athletically gifted organization. We’ll expand into a new television market. We’ll pick up the entire middle east on Al Jazeera-U. Even if they aren’t on the Atlantic Coast. It still makes as much sense as extending a bid to Louisville, Notre Dame, or – God forbid – Texas A&M.”