University Sports Apologia

The purpose of this study is to analyze image repair strategies used within college athletics, specifically football. Apologia is utilized in the public realm by a person or organization that needs to apologize to their public or fans for an undesirable action. This research focuses on apologies with athletes, coaches and universities as a whole. Using Benoit's image repair framework, a content analysis was conducted to examine two football programs. Ohio State, who's athletes were involved in selling memorabilia for services, and the University of North Carolina, who had some academic fraud where athletes were given unfair treatment to keep them eligible to play. Their public apologies were transcribed and coded to identify which image repair strategies were most often utilized, and in which contexts they were used. This research found that mortification was the most commonly used strategy within the study. (page 3)