The Memphis Tigers play basketball in a gymnasium called The Pyramid. Considering that the ancient Egyptians used pyramids as tombs, that seems rather apt right now.

A program sliding into irrelevance appears to have hastened that slide with the disturbing news about coach Tic Price's resignation -- and the accompanying police investigation -- just a week before the season opener. In the what-else-could-go-wrong downward spiral of Memphis hoops, this is a new low. This is an injection of embalming fluid.

	Lorenzen Wright was Memphis' last marquee player.

Memphis will not be confused with Duke when it comes to purity of purpose, but this is potentially sordid. Price's resignation, followed by reports that he allegedly assaulted a female at his home last month, means that two of the last three Tigers head coaches have left their positions amid criminal investigations. Dana Kirk was the other, stepping down in 1986 and eventually doing time in the slammer for income-tax evasion.

Who would ever have thought that Memphians may now be looking back so fondly on the Larry Finch days?

As a player, Finch led the Tigers to the 1973 Final Four but was squeezed out as coach in 1997 after 11 years of declining recruiting and declining returns. Most Memphis fans rejoiced when Finch was pinched, but in retrospect it's been nothing but bad news since then.

At least Finch was the one coach not to flatly embarrass the university.

As of Tuesday, Price had left town and left the talking to his lawyer, who issued a statement saying that Price quit because of "personal failings." A flaming fax, filled with damning allegations against Price, started the turmoil and has made the rounds with the media. It doesn't get much uglier than this.

"It's a dark day for Memphis," athletic director R.C. Johnson told the Memphis Commercial Appeal, in something of an understatement.

Price was 30-27 in his two years coaching the Tigers, producing nothing more substantial than an NIT bid in 1998. Last season was a thorough disappointment, as a team picked in many preseason Top 25s flopped, losing six straight games in December and January and never regaining its stride.

Memphis often looked selfish and undisciplined, reflecting poorly on Price's ability to mold his talent into a cohesive team. The fans, normally among the most passionate in America, showed their dissatisfaction by not turning out. Attendance averaged 13,913 per home in in the 20,142-seat Pyramid, and not a single game sold out.

And now this. A criminal investigation.

Even before the coaching meltdown, this season shaped up to be worse than last year. Not only did Omar Sneed and his 16.7 points and 7.5 rebounds leave via expired eligibility, but blooming star Jimmie "Snap" Hunter was academically ineligible and left school. Hunter averaged 16.2 points per game as a freshman and looked like the latest in a long line of hometown heroes to star for Memphis.

So now associate coach Johnny Jones steps into the quicksand, trying to prepare the Tigers to open the season against Georgetown on Monday in the Maui Invitational. With North Carolina, Florida and Purdue also in the field, Memphis figures to be lucky to win one game before returning to the problems on the mainland.

Jones is a 38-year-old with no head-coaching experience. Prior to coming to Memphis in 1997, the entirety of his coaching experience came at the right hand of Dale Brown (eek!) at LSU. Jones was named in the Lester Earl violations and cleared of the most serious allegations, but the NCAA did implicate him in some minor violations it said were committed by LSU.

Athletic director Johnson put Jones on a one-year probation last Nov. 20 as a result of the LSU investigation. Now he's hustling to clear away that probation, since Jones is the interim coach.

Perhaps the only good news for Jones and the Tigers is that they are playing in Conference USA's South Division, which is not where Cincinnati, DePaul and Louisville reside.

But the problems run deeper than this season.

This is a program that has been to the Final Four in 1973 and '85 and has racked up 43 winning seasons since World War II. From 1981-96, Memphis averaged 22 victories a year and played in 11 NCAA Tournaments.

But its last NCAA Tournament game came when 1996 (an ugly loss to Drexel), and its last NCAA Tournament win was in '95. Not since Penny Hardaway was a sophomore has Memphis made a regional final (1992, if you're scoring at home).

Hardaway left a year early, and the next big-timer, center Lorenzen Wright, split after his sophomore season. That didn't help matters.

But the biggest threat to long-term viability is a loosening on the Tigers' stranglehold on the hometown talent. During the glory years, you had a better chance of stealing the White House cutlery than you did stealing a recruit out of Memphis. That was the program's lifeblood.

But Tony Delk of nearby Brownsville wound up at Kentucky and led the Wildcats to the 1996 NCAA title. And in the real killers to Finch, Memphians Robert O'Kelley and Tony Harris, fled to Wake Forest and Tennessee, respectively, where they have thrived.

But recruiting problems and winning games are the least of Memphis' immediate problems. For now it must deal with the taint left behind by Tic Price.

Pat Forde of the Louisville Courier-Journal is a regular contributor to ESPN.com.