Six years ago, the University of Maryland announced with great fanfare that it had made a leap to one of the nation’s most powerful athletic conferences, a move that carried the promise of riches and prestige.

This week, the gambit blew up in spectacular fashion over three tumultuous days during which the president announced his retirement, the football coach was fired and the chairman of the university’s governing board resigned.

The trigger was the death of a 19-year-old football player named Jordan McNair, who collapsed from heatstroke after practice in the sweltering heat in May and died two weeks later.

The resulting controversy became a power struggle fed by enormous financial and political pressures. And hovering over it all was the question of who at the University of Maryland would be held responsible for the McNair tragedy.