Ya know, ANY university of this size worth its salt would have had its own undercover private investigator giving administrative decision-makers enough signals on this matter...even if such an investigator might not give them the full scoop so that such an admin could create distance as to exactly what he knew...The scandal broke early last Fall...the Penn State Admin had over 8 months before the Freeh report came out in July...and almost 9 months pre NCAA sanctions.
The Penn State admin knew -- or should have known -- exactly what was "challenge-able" from either the report or the sanctions...Such an investigator could certainly reinforce what was "defensible" from Penn State's angle...
Guess what? They did neither.
Your admins are still in place @ Penn State, are they not? (Then why are you posting any blame further than them?)
Actually I agree 100%, and if you talk to most Penn Staters they'll tell you that after Sandusky their anger is directed at an inept and self-serving board of trustees. There's a very strong argument to be made that the BoT and university president breached their fiduciary responsibility by failing to do exactly what you suggested above.