For every success story that climbs onto the pedestal are those that got stepped on in the path. It’s naive to think so, but worth keeping in perspective that it’s not all sunshine and rainbows in College Football. The gaudy NIL money, pageantry, and overall positivity paint a layer of sheen on a surface level. Scratch beneath and for all the bluebloods that have millions of dollars and just as many fans. There are programs that ceased to exist before they even got their feet set. A damning revelation that also serves as a cautionary tale has come to occur.

Imagine being a school that looks at the pandemic in 2020 and tries to get something good to stem from it. They foray into athletics with a football program to complement 8 other varsity sports they partake in. But the train just never picks steam. In fact, it gets halted abruptly within 4 seasons. The most hapless aspect of it all? Their wins and losses were never even officially recognized by the NCAA. It’s almost as if the program never existed in the first place. Talk about being doomed from the get-go.

This is the unfortunate reality for North American University. For a name so vanilla, the short history of their CFB program was rather spicy. Begun as a Texas Gulf Institute in 2007 by Turkish founders, it didn’t gain stats as a full-fledged university till 2013. As the school grew in stature over the years, they decided to delve into athletics. A big part of the American collegiate culture but one the Turkish founders were uninitiated about. You can see the cracks which led to what has transpired in 2025.

“This was a difficult decision, backed by the Board of Trustees, that aims to direct investment to the things that make North American University exceptional,” said athletic director Kenneth Apande after the decision to close CFB operations. “Our goal is to still compete in the eight NAIA and USCAA sports that will remain an integral part of the NAU experience.” The AD has provided a very generic account of why the program is being shut so quickly. But there’s a lot of underlying history that contextualizes what went down with NAU. There are even accusations of terrorist activity involved.

The program ends with a 8-32 “record”. In the books however, it’s not quite that. Because NAU never gained full membership in the NAIA, the NCAA didn’t count their results against its members. NAU’s inability to gain official status for the program meant there was always an expiry date looming. Another wrinkle in their history is their televised ESPN game against Lamar in 2021. North American University had the text “logo” beside their name on the broadcast. Rather than an actual logo! Perhaps someone missed an email back at the school. To add to this national embarrassment, they lost the game 47-3. Such mishaps were a regular occurrence for NAU. But this game against Lamar also spewed fallacious terrorism allegations which caught on quickly.

North American University brass was hit with scathing allegations of terrorism

Florida-based journalist Timothy Burke chose to dive into how and when North American University came to be when he saw that game broadcast on ESPN. After posting a series of clips on X showing the horrible football on display, he took things beyond trolling. “[Serif Ali] Tekalan was recently appointed the president of North American University, according to a Dec. 19 statement. Tekalan is on the Turkish Interior Ministry’s Most Wanted terrorists list, with a reward of 750,000 liras for information leading to his capture” he relayed to his substantial X following which now sits at over 100k. This naturally spread like wildfire. Turns out, it was a false alarm. Somewhat.

This story was dispelled by Cory Hogue of Texas Football. “Burke [alleged he] unearthed evidence that NAU was on an ‘NCAA blacklist,’ and the university’s president at that time was once on ‘Turkey’s Most Wanted list in connection to terrorism accusations.’ NAU was not “blacklisted” by the NCAA…As for the terrorism accusations, one should recall the story of Enes Kanter Freedom, who was placed on Turkey’s terrorist wanted list in 2023.” Former NBA player Enes Kanter Freedom is of Turkish origin himself. Hogue implied that the government throws around the “terrorist” label extremely loosely. Even for something as partisan as speaking out against them.

Alas, incidents like this kept casting a gloomy cloud over NAU. They never really were able to shrug off the negativity. Now that the football program has reached closure, the athletic director and powers that be will hope they can move on with a clean slate. No program was ever going to kick into gear just 4 years in. Even the biggest ones took time to lay the foundations. This does seem like a step towards damage control rather than one taken for sporting reasons.