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Pete Carroll still bitter about USC sanctions

Feb 27, 2014 • 3:38 pm

Before Pete Carroll became a Super Bowl winning coach in Seattle, he helped build a premier college football team at USC.

But despite his accomplishments at USC, which included a 2004 BCS national championship, part of his legacy has been tainted with the sanctions placed on the university by the NCAA as a result to improper benefits received by Reggie Bush's family.

Carroll spoke to the Los Angeles Times after a speaking engagement at USC

“We made some mistakes along the way but I don’t think it was dealt with properly,” he said. “I thought it was dealt with poorly and very irrationally and done with way too much emotion instead of facts.”

He added: “We just didn’t know what was going on," he said. "Had we known I would like to think we would do the right thing and would have stopped everything and fixed it by doing what we should have done. But unfortunately, because we didn’t know, the university gets killed over the deal.

Carroll also alleged that the NCAA had it out for the Trojans from the start, assuming they were guilty without considering all of the facts.

"They didn't understand a thing about what we were all about. ... They never were here," Carroll said. "And they didn't want to hear it. They never even got close to hearing what we're all about."

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Aaron Wilson covers the Ravens for The Baltimore Sun.

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