It sits on a hill overlooking a seaside landscape off in the distance. Its campus is quiet and serene, an example of the academic environment it sells. It has a tiny basketball pavilion, and a beautiful small football stadium built into a hillside. There are palm trees and manicured lawns everywhere.

The University of San Diego is the closest thing to an Ivy League school as there is in this corner of the nation.

As the sun shined off its campus buildings this weekend, in the quiet solitude of a Sunday, where its student-athletes were getting ready for final exams in the library, it belied the turmoil, angst, and quiet outrage within those buildings.

USD is facing the darkest moment in school history, with the FBI probe of point-shaving in its basketball program underway. You did not have to hear the shaken voices of its basketball coach Bill Grier, see the color go out of the face of its Athletic Director, or listen to the boiling rage of the school President last Friday to understand how the mission of a great Catholic university had been betrayed.

In whispers within the hallway of its basketball pavilion, you could sense the fear that we have not heard the last of the story involving all-time leading scorer Brandon Johnson, their former basketball star, who allegedly shaved points in a game in 2010 and may have approached teammates to do the same in a game this past February.

You only have to read the 6-page FBI report when 10 were arrested to know that this scandal has far-reaching tentacles -- into northern California, where a drug buy was purported, to Las Vegas, where lopsided bets were placed on USD games, back to the campus, where money was exchanged.

This appears to be more than just an isolated incident. In question was a stretch of games in February 2010, where a gifted USD team tanked, losing 10 of 11. Last winter, More games, from last winter, are being examined as the team lost 5 of 6 in February 2011.

Connecting the dots, Johnson had some horrible outings as the 2010 season slipped away. You wonder if a good player could have bad games, as Coach Bill Grier indicated, or whether there were payoffs for bad point performances. And in 2011, as the team spiraled to a disgraceful 6-24 record, you have to wonder about losses to other woeful teams.

The U.S. Attorney's report talked about $120,000 changing hands in drug transactions from some of the people arrested. You read of large bets being placed in as many as 10 casinos and off-shore betting accounts on USD games. And you wonder about bad losses to bad teams in the midst of woeful seasons.

Mary Lyons, the President of the school, had no knowledge of a pending probe, when the FBI contacted the university about a meeting to talk about on-campus issues.

Imagine Coach Bill Grier, with FBI officials knocking at his door at 6:30 a.m., to question him about his star player.

Stunned was the emotion of Athletic Director Ky Snyder, when he was informed a half hour later of the wide variety of allegations involving his tiny athletic program.

Incidents of this magnitude happen at major schools. This is not Auburn, where "thousand dollar handshakes" from boosters to players are being looked at. Surely there should be no confusion that USD is anywhere near the program of USC or Ohio State, stung by the Reggie Bush and Terrelle Pryor scandals.

This is USD, where "student athlete" has an enormous meaning. Where they are proud of the greatness of their graduates. Where the degree from its Law School is valued worldwide.

USD made the headlines on ESPN Sports Center a couple of years back, when this same Brandon Johnson drove the basketball team to an upset win over Connecticut in the NCAA tournament. And now on Friday night, the same Brandon Johnson was in the headlines, with the school logo, as ESPN led with the basketball scandal as its top story.

Johnson is free on bail in Texas. Eight of the 10 linked to the marijuana ring, the gambling, the intimidation incident, and the payoffs for point shaving, are out on bail too. It is surely the not the end of the story.

Questions remain to be answered. Did Johnson make a drug buy, get in debt, and get forced into shaving points? Did the all-time leading scorer get into gambling debts himself, and find someone to bail him out? Did an assistant coach, long since departed, act as a middleman, and make the contacts and propose the payoffs? Do gambling debts of someone attached to USD have something to do with all this? How do you connect the dots of drug buys to basketball?

The FBI knows some of the answers, and will know more soon.

There is history in all this. Arizona State came through a scandal involving four games and its leading scorer Stevin Smith. He did 14 months in prison. Toledo has four athletes involved with possible point shaving in football and basketball, linked to a mini-mobster in Michigan. Tulane and Boston College had players go to prison for similar involvements in the 1980s. The all-time worst scandal took down the legendary New York college programs at NYU, City College, Brooklyn College, and spilled over to Kentucky and Akron in the early 1950s.

You hope for the best, that Brandon Johnson is isolated in all this. That it was him and him alone, no other teammates, and no other games. But there is too much history out there, that both you and USD should be scared. You fear the worst. One game will likely lead you to more. The fact that contacts were made in a second season sets the stage for something worse.

USD's all-star guard had hopes of playing in the NBA someday as a walk-on free agent. He may have trouble now realizing that dream, for you cannot hit three-point shots from prison.

Lyons, Snyder and Grier were terribly shaken, but stood tall to say they will lead this university out of this mess. Credit them for courage, for being unified, and for remaining committed that this is not what will define USD, nor bring its program down.

A sunbathed campus on Sunday afternoon, its beauty everywhere, belied the sick feeling within, that USD has been betrayed by their star basketball player, and people from outside of its academic world. In the quiet out front of their library, you feel like screaming, asking how a great school like this could be soiled by one of its own.

You feel sad for good people at a sparkling school and ache for what the University of San Diego must now go through to get rid of this stain.