Early on, before the season got underway, Cobb says that he was approached by a man from Pittsburgh named Rocco Perla, who hed seen hanging around campus with his teammate, senior forward Rick Kuhn. He spent countless in the gym, practicing his basketball skills, replaying a very hurtful experience over and over in his mind, from when he was cut from his junior high school basketball team back in Stamford. Id also developed a reputation in school as a troublemaker. Hed averaged 21.3 points per game during the 1978-1979 season, leading the Eagles to a 21-8 record. Eventually, he became a part of my own family and spent a lot of time over at our house. They had a beautiful campus and it was small enough to where I could function, and yet it was big enough that I could get the exposure I needed to fulfill my dreams.. Cobb just wanted to live his life and do what he did best: play ball. I was this poor kid with no financial resources, going on trial with a member of the mob. Boston College; Induction 2023; Position: Linebacker Years: 2009-11 Place of Birth: Cincinnati, OH Date of Birth: April 20, 1991 Jersey Number: 40 Height: 6-3 Weight: 238 High School: St. Xavier (Cincinnati, OH) Possessing a powerful combination of size, speed and football intellect, . The abbreviated version of events reads like this:the Perlas brought in a Pittsburgh hood named Paul Mazzei, who contacted his friend Henry Hill, an associate of New Yorks Lucchese crime family that had befriended him during a stretch in federal prison. Use without license or authorization is expressly prohibited. And he always managed to be seen cruising around his neighborhood with a new, expensive one. standards like the rest of the students, most who came from wealthy and very strong academic backgrounds. Leading scorer Ernie Cobb was accused . Here was someone who believed in him, someone who was willing to work with him and teach him about this game of basketball, which he loved more than anything. I told him, I think were gonna blow them out, we look really good. I was back at home, visiting for the summer and about to return to Israel, Cobb said. But for Bowie, it was too little, too late. Hes a good person. age of adaline comet. He would teach me about these attributes and I began to internalize them. Cobb admitted to accepting $1,000 but wasn't prosecuted. I felt valued, that I mattered and that people cared about me. Join us for a March Madness Webinar on Tuesday, March 7 at 8pm ET. We werent locked in individual cells. Cobb and Sweeney admitted to accepting money, but both deny willingly participating while on the basketball court. Sweeney fessed up to taking $500 under duress and escaped prosecution. Couldnt they see how grateful he was, that hed never cheat the thing that gave his life such meaning and purpose? If you got your own apartment after high school, that was considered a success. Select the first team from the drop down menu. I was practicing every day and so angry at the coach who cut me, said Cobb. inStamford,Connecticut Ernest was born in Harlem, the first son of the . Do you have a sports website? A fitness fanatic who augmented his training by swimming and riding his bicycle very long distances, Cobb hopped on his ten-speed shortly after the indictment was announced and began pedaling. I just thank God there is justice.. His mother, Hattie, worked as a domestic and struggled to provide for her four children. Rocco Perla received a four-year sentence and Rick Kuhn was sentenced to a ten-year bid as well, which was later reduced to 28 months. A social worker at the facility, who took notice of Ernies work ethic and burgeoning athletic potential, contacted Herm Alswanger, the varsity basketball coach at Stamford High School, where the youngster would soon enroll upon his release from Meriden. He tried to subsist as a substitute teacher, and even caddied at the Fairview Country Club in Greenwich, Connecticut, the affluent suburbs where hed previously been arrested for stealing bikes as a kid. On Saturday morning, March 24, 1984, a tiny blurb in newspaper sports sections across the nation read: Ex-basketball star Ernie Cobb was acquitted Friday of taking part in a point-shaving scandal that rocked Boston College in 1978-1979, and tearfully asked for a fair shot to resurrect his chances at a pro career. In a point-shaving scandal that sticks in the memories of many, three Boston College players became embroiled in a betting scheme conceived by gamblers Henry Hill, Rocco and Tony Perla, and Paul Mazzei. I was like, Yeah, whatever. Sure enough, a few weeks later, he hands my girlfriend an envelope. He ate, drank and slept basketball. During his court hearing, the judge sentenced him to a six-month sentence in the Meriden Juvenile Detention Facility. He killed people. I have suffered. He says he believes his experience could serve as a test case for others, to help prevent anything like it from happening in the future. At 11:05 a.m., United States District Judge Leonard Wexler completed his instructions to the jury in the Federal Court Building in Brooklyn as Ernie Cobb awaited his judgment. I opened up the door and it was these guys from the F.B.I., said Cobb. Height: 6-3. As for his role in what happened, Sweeney says hes never run from the truth. I was mesmerized.. Stamford took front and center in the story when it was revealed that Boston College's top scorer, Stamford High School star Ernie Cobb, was among those being investigated. Good morning!ESPN's "Playing for the Mob" has rekindled embarrassing memories for not only Boston College but also The Boston Globe, 35 . The game had saved his life, delivered him from peril, from a path leading nowhere, from dysfunction and illiteracy, to an elite college education and a shot at the NBA and a better future. It all seemed like a fairytale, until he was indicted for allegedly fixing college basketball games for the mob. Sweeney said he decided to cooperate with Lavine and co-director Cayman Grant because he believed they would treat the subject fairly. Kuhn enlisted the help of starters Ernie Cobb . But I found out that I wouldnt be allowed to leave the United States because the government was going to bring me to trial.. He turned to me and said, Coach, Im glad youre sticking up for your kid. A wake will be held for Dr. Cobb-Stevens on Monday, July 16, from 4-7 p.m. at the Chapman, Cole & Gleason Funeral Home, 475 Main . Some 36 years later, there doesn't seem to be a lot of love lost between key characters Rick Kuhn, Ernie Cobb, and Jim Sweeney, the trio of Eagles allegedly paid to keep scores as close as they . Checkout the latest stats of Ernie Cobb. He worked hard in class. I had my own place to live and all the food I wanted to eat. who were in it from the beginning, and Ernie Cobb . Rocco and Tony Perla were giving money to Rick Kuhn. rick kuhn boston college now. And I dont think it ever stayed with me.. Everything Id worked so hard for was coming to fruition.. Out of everything that happened, thats one thing that hurts me tremendously, Cobb said. The Boston Globe story was initially investigated and written by a young Boston College alumnus named Leslie Visser, who would go on to become a very accomplished, groundbreaking journalist and role model for women who aspired to work in the field of sports media. That fascination only increased when the mobster who fingered Sweeney hit the big screen years later in Martin Scorseses Goodfellas., Every year I would pitch this story, Lavine said. Hes innocent., When they indicted me, they wanted Peter Vario, the mobster, so they tried us together, said Cobb. Id led the pro league in scoring over there and signed a very nice contract. I walk in the bathroom, and who was in there but Peter Vario, the big-time mobster that was on trial with Ernie, said Alswanger. I was a senior in high school when Ernie Cobb was a senior at Boston College and Id heard that he was a very good player, said Lemuel Mills, a Boston area hoops aficionado, coach, community mentor and historian. At one point Hill curses, apologizes sheepishly to the camera, and then falls right back into his expletive-laden speech. It had to cost around $200,000 at the time to defend me.. Henry Hill avoided going to prison, and he went off into the sunset of the governments Witness Protection Program, said Alswanger. I felt like, You put my name out there, so let me clear my name! When they investigated me, I told them straight up about the $1,000 that Rocco Perla had given me. Cobb insisted on having his day in court, of clearing his name. All content 2000-2023 RealGM, L.L.C. From that day on, I became very studious.. 21, right in first row) were part of the . I moved on many, many years ago, and I think the worst thing you can do is blame others or even blame yourself because thats kinda like a poison that just stays with you. But its the points that Cobb and teammate Michael Bowie didnt score during the 1978-1979 season which has spawned a federal investigation. I could see myself coming into my own one day and doing that. Experience for 11 years as a high school mathematics teacher. When he first stepped on the hallowed parquet floor at the legendary Boston Garden, where B.C. She knew the terrain in terms of what I needed to be doing, said Cobb. The main thing was that they were really trying to rehabilitate us and teach us, hoping to turn us around before we became hardened criminals. Thoughts continuously raced through Cobbs mind: How had he arrived here, he wondered, of all places, charged with allegedly conspiring to commit sports bribery while allegedly fixing college basketball games for the mob? I went into the Caldors department store in downtown Stamford when I was about 12 years old and tried to shoplift one, he said. Subscribe to Stathead Basketball: Get your first month FREEYour All-Access Ticket to the Basketball Reference Database. After more than a decade spent trying to make Playing with the Mob happen, Lavine is ready to move on to a new project. Weight: 238. After he interviewed him, he fell in love with him and told me, Hes innocent. In the early 1960s, as job prospects dwindled in the area, his father, James Cobb, the 2nd-oldest of 21 kids, decided to move his family up north, which was more industrialized, and hence had more job opportunities than the agriculture-dependent south. us, College: He also . He really set the tone in terms of being a strong, dynamic, willful player that wondrous talents like John Bagley, Michael Adams and Dana Barros, all of whom went on to play ball in the NBA after their careers at B.C., followed. Ernie Cobb, the star of the Boston College basketball team in the 1978-79 season, was found not guilty yesterday of charges that he joined a game- rigging conspiracy to benefit gamblers that season. On the stand during the trial, Rick Kuhns girlfriend, Barbara Reed, with whom he shared an apartment during his senior year at Boston College, testified that she overheard Kuhn and Sweeney discussing the Fordham game, saying that they had to keep the ball away from Cobb because he shot the ball all the time. This has gone on for four years. Jim Sweeney and Ernie Cobb) were brought to trial for point-shaving during the '78- '79 season. Thursday, March 22, 1984. I was doing well academically and the dream of playing professional basketball was getting closer.. But well come back to that later. The tone is set by black-and-white mug shots and film strips from surveillance of mobsters interspersed with BC team photos and action shots from newspaper coverage of the season. By his sophomore year, he was a starter on the varsity and an All-League selection. Height: 5'11" (180 cm) Weight: 0 lbs (- kg) Position: PG. ET on ESPN. Kuhn acknowledged his role and was the only player convicted. Its something that hes still waiting for, to this day. First Name. His father found work in cement construction as a hard laborer in Stamford, Connecticut, the third-largest city in the state that is situated approximately 30 miles from New York City. Boston College, Draft: Javascript is required for the selection of a player. The story: Three Boston College players leading scorer Ernie Cobb, forward Richard Kuhn and Sweeney, the team's point guard were fingered by Hill for participating in the point-shaving scheme.

Orangeburg County Forfeited Land Commission, Articles E