By Craig Degel
Arizona Daily Wildcat
Two University of Arizona football players were cleared Saturday by Pacific 10 Conference officials of any wrongdoing stemming from allegations that they received gifts from a California sports agent.
It was reported by the Los Angeles Times on Saturday that Arizona defensive end Tedy Bruschi and receiver Richard Dice were among as many as 15 players being investigated for links to agent Robert T. Caron of Oxnard, Calif. Also named in the investigation were the University of California at Los Angeles' Donnie Edwards, the University of California-Berkeley's Iheanyi Uwaezuoke, Oregon State University's Reggie Tongue and Sean Boyd, Marcus Wall, Leon Johnson and Fuzzy Lee of the University of North Carolina.
"I don't know what the allegations were. All I know is that I did nothing wrong," Bruschi said.
"I got a call from some guy," Dice said. "I'm not even worried about it. This will probably get blown way out of proportion."
UA athletic director Jim Livengood said his offices looked into the matter when they were first notified on Friday, and, along with Pac-10 officials, found neither player was guilty of any wrongdoing. Both were cleared in time to play in Saturday's 20-15 UA victory over the Golden Bears of Cal.
"They made good decisions when whoever it was offered them some phone credit card Ÿ they turned it down," UA head coach Dick Tomey said. "All we can do is try to educate the guys. All of a sudden they have these newfound friends. We just tell the guys, 'Don't accept anything from anybody, anyway.'"
The allegations against Bruschi and Dice came in the wake of the suspensions and investigations of