CORAL GABLES ? DeQuan Jones says he never showed his frustration or sadness, but it was perpetually there for the Miami Hurricanes forward as he helplessly watched the season pass by without him.
"It was tearing me up just sitting on the sideline and watching my teammates play and not be able to help," Jones recalled Thursday on the eve of his second game since being cleared by UM and the NCAA to return.
He called his parents every day for support, and then about two weeks ago, his father suggested maybe the family should fight the university's season-long suspension of Jones ? a decision that had been made as a precaution because of the NCAA's ongoing investigation into the player's alleged involvement with former booster Nevin Shapiro.
UM didn't want to risk further sanctions should it later come out that Jones was guilty and thus the Hurricanes had used an ineligible player.
Watching every home game from the team's bench, and road games by himself while chomping on food from Chipotle, "ate me up a little bit," Jones said.
So the senior finally contested the suspension to get his eligibility restored. On Dec. 20, UM announced that, after consulting with the NCAA, it had reinstated Jones.
It wasn't just important to Jones to return to the court, but also to clear his name.
"Absolutely. Even if I wasn't able to get on the court, one of my biggest frustrations was people looking at me in a certain sense, assuming things," Jones said.
Shapiro, a convicted Ponzi schemer, alleged in a Yahoo! Sports report in August that he gave former UM assistant coach Jake Morton $10,000 in the summer of 2008 to secure the commitment of Jones after Morton told him a member of Jones' family required the payment. Shapiro told Yahoo! he believed Jones was unaware of the transaction.
Jones said it's "big" for him to cleanse his reputation.
"Coming from a small town [Stone Mountain, Ga.] like myself, everyone is close knit, everybody knows you according to your family," he said, "and my family, we've always kept a positive image amongst ourselves and we always give off a positive vibe. Everybody that knows me and has come into contact with me knows I'm not that type of guy."
Guard Durand Scott said Jones struggled to cope with the allegations the first couple of days after the story linking him to Shapiro broke.
"That's not news anybody would like to hear. He was really down when he first heard that," Scott said. "Teammates and coaches, we picked him up. And he motivated himself as well, stuck it through and tried to push us and push himself to become better."
Said center Reggie Johnson: "I couldn't have put up with it. He's a very strong person for it."
Jones said he received more positive feedback than negativity from fellow students and others. He continued practicing with the team even after the school ruled him ineligible Nov. 10.
"Every day I practiced to push my teammates, make them better," Jones said. "And also I kind of had it in the back of my mind that if I was to play the next game, I had to practice twice as hard so I would be ready."
Said assistant coach Eric Konkol: "He has been the model of being positive. He always has a smile. There were days where he certainly wished that he'd be playing, but it never affected practice.
"He was on the scout team and he gave everything he had. He prepared extremely well. He's been a model and a guy I'll refer to as long as I'm coaching about how to handle a situation like that."
Jones was laying in bed watching TV last week when he received a phone call from a UM official telling him he was eligible and could play two nights later at Charlotte.
Jones started throwing shirts and shoes in a bag. He'd be heading to North Carolina the next morning to join his teammates. That night, he couldn't sleep. At 11 p.m., he went to the gym and shot baskets.
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