Jason Terry says Arizona needs to ‘clean house’

On Friday, ESPN reported that FBI wiretaps show Arizona Wildcats head coach Sean Miller had phone conversations with former sports agent Christian Dawkins about paying $100,00 to ensure the signing of star freshman Deandre Ayton.

Shortly after, ex-assistants Book Richardson and Joe Pasternack were mentioned in a Yahoo! story in which emails showed they worked with agents to try to secure recruits like Brian Bowen.

It is a damning development for Miller and the Arizona program that could lead to significant repercussions, including the end of the Miller Era.

Jason Terry is ready for that, apparently.

The former Arizona guard tweeted Friday that “it’s time to clean house and bring home our own bloodlines to carry on Lute’s Legacy. We have too much pride, too much tradition to allow outsiders to tear down what we built.”

It is sort of ironic that Terry is the one calling for this, since he took money from an agent while at Arizona, but his point stands.

And these aren’t exactly the first black marks on Arizona’s program in the Miller Era. Here are some others in just the last three seasons:

• Elliott Pitts was suspended in 2015-16 for sexual misconduct and eventually left the program.
• Allonzo Trier was suspended in 2016-17 for 19 games after testing positive for a performance-enhancing drug, and is now suspended again.
• This offseason, Richardson was arrested, suspended, and indicted for his role in a recruiting bribery scandal.
• Dylan Smith was suspended for the regular season opener after violating team rules.
• Keanu Pinder and assistant coach Mark Phelps were suspended for one game and five days, respectively, for violating NCAA rules.

Arizona has yet to release a statement regarding the ESPN report, but it is hard to imagine Miller keeping his job if it is true.

In the meantime, here are what some other former UA players said about the matter: