Louisville Refuses To Pay Half-Court Contest Winner Because They Are The WORST

“The university is working on a different prize so that he doesn’t go home empty handed.” - Sports Illustrated

Make no mistake about it, Jackson Logsdon, a 20-year old Louisville student was robbed by his university and contest administrator Million Dollar Media last Thursday at a women’s hoops game.

And not just a little light theft like when you maybe swipe of a little something something from a frat party, but like actually robbed in the form of failure to pay up on a $38,000 prize.

At halftime of the game, Logsdon hit a layup, free throw, three-pointer and a half-court shot in 30 seconds to pay for nearly an entire year of his out-of-state tuition.

With all the talk of debt around the country and here on Two Buttons Deep (with more to come), $38,000 would’ve gone a damn long way. But unfortunately, Jackson had played high school hoops within the last 6 years and therefore was later notified he was disqualified from accepting the prize.

“It is a huge bummer as I am an out-of-state student,” Logsdon told the Courier-Journal in an email Friday. “It would have went a long way to paying off student loans and anything in that manner. It was still an awesome experience and something I’ll never forget. Very bittersweet though.”

Overall, Jackson took the news in stride and was much more understanding than most us would have been:

He had played 3 years of high school hoops, primarily as a bench player, but that was enough to make this moment nothing more than a reason to score a few free drinks at campus parties (non-alcoholic, obviously):

As someone who played one year of freshmen basketball (NBD, but KBD) let me assure you that getting handed a jersey and getting to tell girls you’re on the team prepares you approximately 0% for this moment.

I recall 518 legend Paul Yattaw instructing me to simply and bluntly “not shoot” despite being a starter (again, NBD, but KBD) and countless other friends who stayed in the school program throughout senior year and averaged well under 5 points per game.

There are some kids who can barely walk and chew gum at the same time who end up on their high school teams simply because of the number of kids in their school or shockingly lack of athleticism of the student body, so denying a college kid of this opportunity that could have had a very significant impact on his financial future is criminal.

In 2016 Louisville athletics brought in over $104 million in revenue and for some perspective, the prize *that was not* paid out to Logsdon would represent 0.036% of that figure.

Jackson Logsdon deserves justice and payment from the college system that gauges students every single year and leaves the majority of them hampered with such excessive debt that is follows them well into adulthood. And by payment I do not mean in the form of Louisville swag.

Let’s make sure this moment represents more than just a memory for the young man.

“When the shot left my hands I knew it had a chance and when it went in I can’t explain the excitement and thrill I felt,” he said. “It was a total out of body experience that I’ll remember forever.”