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When NCAA eligibility dramas aren’t equal

Two of college basketball’s premier programs are dealing with freshmen eligibility questions. But you’d never know it.

Everyone’s atwitter (pun intended) about Kentucky recruit Enes Kanter. Did he receive more than $100,000 in salary and expenses from his Turkish club, Fenerbahce Ulker? Or is the team merely staging a prolonged shakedown for a payment or the return of Kanter’s services?

All it took was a N.Y. Times article with Fenerbahce’s general manager denying the shakedown and ripping Kanter’s academic qualifications. “Enes has a good basketball potential yet academically, he is not gifted as much,” Nedim Karakas told the paper.

As a result, my Twitter feed blew up. Responses ranged from indignation regarding Karakas’ comment, to Fenerbahce’s stance on the shakedown to outright weariness on the whole drama.

(Count me among the final group. I’d ready for the NCAA to rule on Kanter so we can all move on.)

Meanwhile, Kansas is still waiting on the NCAA to rule on Josh Selby, who is in limbo because of his association with Robert Frazier, the business manager for Carmelo Anthony. Selby’s mom says Frazier’s a longtime family friend and has merely advised her son. The NCAA is making up its own mind.

Not that anyone seems to care outside of Kansas.

Jayhawks coach Bill Self and Selby spoke at the Jayhawks’ media day, but didn’t have much to say, mostly because they didn’t have anything to report.

“We hope to have a resolution to it sooner rather than later. But I don’t know when that will be,” Self said. “I certainly understand why this has taken a little bit of time but I do think there will be a positive conclusion. Hopefully, shortly. But I don’t know that to be a fact.”

Most seem to think it’s only a matter of time before Selby - Rivals.com’s No. 1 recruit in 2010 - is eligible. Kanter’s anyone’s guess. (John Calipari says Kanter will play.)

Thing is, both players are crucial to a pair of Final Four contenders and both are in a similar situation. But it’s not that Kentucky or Kansas did anything wrong in taking these guys -- several schools wanted Selby, while Kanter de-committed from Washington to head to Lexington -- but the underlying theme is that Kentucky is, in fact, cheating.

Why the disconnect? Maybe it’s the overseas and payment issues surrounding Kanter that makes the news around him more frenzied. Maybe it’s that he plays for Kentucky, which is in 24/7 coverage. Or maybe it’s that he’s a Calipari recruit.

Schadenfreude may as well be an English word.

Mike Miller’s also on Twitter @BeyndArcMMiller, usually talkin’ hoops. Click here for more.