Baylor football fighting to restore its integrity

WACO, Texas Baylor coach Jim Grobe leads theteam prayer in a spaciouslocker room before his first pregame speech since 2013. It takes 15 seconds."Play for each other, dont do anything don't do anything that wouldnt bring honor to your teammates,"Grobesaid as his voiceticked up. "Thats the key."MORE: That15seconds doesnt erase the three-month aftermath of the school'smishandling of sexual a sault allegations that led to the firing of Art Briles, who compiled a 65-37 record over nine seasons. As each grotesque detail comes to light, Baylor takes another punch via social media, and for one sole reason:The Bears didnt do enough for those namele s victims.Grobe is trying to help make sure it doesn't happen again. Football is a part of that proce s. Before leaving the locker room before the opener against Northwestern State,the players makequick break of their own: "One-two-three...BIG 12 CHAMPS!"Those same playerswould sprint by a white concrete slab at McLane Stadium with deep green lettering:Big 12 Champions 2013 2014."Those two years brought the programintoxicating levels of succe s, but they came with a cost.Baylors players, coaches, administrators and fans Yuli Gurriel Jersey are still coming to grips with that, and Grobe has the unenviable task of cleaning that me s up while maintaining that football program.Baylor did too many things that didn't honor the university, community and football program. Can they ever bring that honor back?****David Fankhauser graduated from Baylor in 2010. Hes a contributor for , and hes struggling to put into words how those last three months felt. He pauses at times. He still feels the shock of Briles' firing and everything after.Ive had a hard time on the blog, Fankhauser said. Where do we defend Baylor, and how do we own it?Fankhauser loves Baylor, but the two-part questionstands. Hes tailgating with friends Wesley Dunlap and Jordan Sakakeeny in 90-degree heat four hours before kickoff. Its abouttrying to find the middle ground with the mix of pride and embarra sment that football succe s brought to a Baptist university that won 10 games once Jose Altuve Jersey before Briles arrival.The Bears won 50 games over the past five seasons. It felt good. Fankhauser and Sakakeeny kid Dunlap for not being there the night Heisman Trophy winner Robert Griffin III led the Bears to a win against No. 5 Oklahoma at the old Floyd Casey Stadium.They watched the rise of the program from the bottom to the top of the Big 12. They welcomed McLane Stadium, a magnificent $260 million structure that overlooks the Brazos River. They saw the upgrades in downtown Waco.Baylor became the high-scoring, it-program with slick uniforms that won back-to-back Big 12 titles. Baylor was the coolest school among the dozen FBS programs in Texas.They also watched it all unravel in a little more than year. There was the 2014conviction of Tevin Elliott on two counts of sexual a sault, .There was , in which Briles allegedly brought on the Boise State transfer despite knowing his history of violence toward women, only to have him found guilty in 2015 of sexual a sault on a Baylor student. That led to the discovery that 2013 accusations of sexual a sault against two football players,Tre'Von Armstead and Shamycheal Chatman, were not investigated until September2015.In April2016, All-American defensive end Shawn Oakman was arrested on sexual a sault charges, and it wasn't the first time he'd been accused while at the school. The school-commi sioned investigation by law firm Pepper Hamiltonand its finding captured all that, and as details continue to Andy Pettitte Jersey surface the question of whether the school will face further punishment continues.MORE: Grobe is finding out how tough it can be to coachin that environment.. None of that had anything to do with those incidents under Briles, but the questions about Baylor's culture persist. Those are questionsGrobe struggled to answer at Big 12 Media Day. He also chooses his words carefully."I'm a football coach, Ilike to do football stuff and I don't like to deal with a lot of the off-the-field stuff I've been dealing with," Grobe said. "The majority of the kids had nothing to do with the problems we've faced over the last three months off the field."The post-Briles era comes with labels. Baylor Tyler Clippard Jersey is the latest FBS-program-gone-bad, but in this age of heightened consciousne s about social i sues,it will never be looked at with the same bad-boyreverence as The U or Pony Expre s.They take turns defending the school while acknowledging what went wrong. They dont want to be compared to Penn State,even ifthat comparison is out there. All that adds up to a stranger-than-usual feeling."It took a lot longer to get excited,"Dunlap said. "There were Title IX problems that needed addre sed. The focus and the easy focus is football, but there are other problems that need to be addre sed."Fankhauser, Dunlap and Sakakeeny arent sure how theyll feel when Baylor takes the field, but theyll be there. "Today is kind of a catharsis for everybody at Baylor,"Fankhauser said. "Were starting from scratch today, and its going to take time. That'sthe one thing Ive been trying to tell people."****Kelly Ongena asks to borrow a cup from Fankhausers tailgate. Shes sitting with fellow Baylor graduates Hillary Smith and Megan Leitch and their friend Laurel Roenbrook. Its an uncomfortable conversation when asked about how your school mishandled sexual a saults. How do you respect the victims while showing pride in your school?Every word comes out slowly."It's a really bad thing that happened, Ongena said. "We cant make mistakes, but we need to move on.""I hope other colleges like Baylor learn from this terrible mistake,"Smith chimes in.MORE: They reiterate how bad they feel for those victims multiple timesbut at the same time saythey always felt safe on campus. They enjoyed that time at Baylor, which happened to coincide with the football teams heyday. More restaurants popped up downtown. They wanted to come back for the opener to have a good time. Its like the billboard reads a few miles from the stadium: "Welcome Home, Baylor Family."Ongena put it out there, too. Baylor did what countle s high schools do in the football-crazy state.That'spart of the identity."Baylor tried for a long time tried to resist not Nolan Ryan Jersey having a good football team,"Ongena said. "We tried to make our mark. This is Texas. You have to have a good football team."****Holly Grobe, wearing a dark green shirt with sleeves rolled up, has been around football her whole life.Shesat in her fifth-floor suite during pregame. She could have convinced Jim to stick with retirement in the comforts of Lake Oconee in Reynolds, Ga. He coached for almost 40 years before retiring from Wak