INDIANAPOLIS—The NCAA Division I Committee on Infractions has placed Mississippi State University on probation for four years and instituted several other penalties for numerous violations in the institution's football program.
These violations centered on recruiting infractions by two former assistant football coaches and several representatives of the university's athletics interests (boosters) and included unethical conduct charges against the two former assistant football coaches. Allegations that the former head football coach violated NCAA unethical conduct bylaws and provided a "substantial recruiting inducement" to a prospect were not found by the committee.
Other penalties imposed by the Committee on Infractions in this case include a ban on postseason play for the 2004 season and reductions in scholarships and official visits. The university is considered a "repeat violator" under NCAA bylaws because the infractions occurred within five years of the starting date for penalties in a 1996 major infractions case involving the football program.
In its public report, the infractions committee specifically emphasized that this case "was processed against the backdrop of swirling rumors and innuendo fueled by media reports and Internet chat boards reverberating with the exchange of insults and threats between supporters of competing teams. "The committee noted that the former head coach even claimed that rival fans hired private investigators "in attempts to uncover violations to be used to place the university on NCAA probation."
"As is noted in this report, this atmosphere complicated the committee's work in determining the facts of the case," the committee said, adding that Mississippi State's president "made eloquent reference to the unhealthy football rivalry that exists in the southeast" during the infractions hearing.
The Committee on Infractions determined that various allegations of misconduct made against NCAA enforcement staff in the Mississippi State investigation were unsubstantiated. The allegations were made by the attorney for the former head coach before and during the infractions hearing, the committee said.
"In any situation, such allegations would be quite troubling," the committee wrote in its report. In this case, they underscored the high level of distrust and the cultural environment for football in the "Southeast" decried by the university president."
The committee also noted that individuals who provided information in the investigation to NCAA enforcement staff "seemed to recast the information initially provided or to deny providing information" after media exposure of their identities and information. "This too was very troubling to the committee," the committee wrote.
The alleged violations in the Mississippi State case first surfaced in the summer and fall of 2001, when NCAA enforcement staff received information about improper lodging for two junior college football recruits. Other credible information about additional NCAA violations surfaced in January 2002, which ultimately triggered an investigation.
The committee determined that numerous recruiting violations took place in the Mississippi State football program. These include several violations of recruiting rules that occurred starting in the fall of the 1998-99 academic year and continuing through January of the 1999-00 academic year. A former assistant football coach (former assistant coach A) and a booster (representative A) committed recruiting violations with two prospective student-athletes (prospects 1 and 2) from the Hattiesburg, Mississippi, area.
These violations included impermissible in-person recruiting contacts on numerous occasions with both recruits, and arranging impermissible employment. The contacts took place at the high school of prospect 2 and other locations. Former assistant coach A also arranged for improper employment for prospect 2 briefly with representative A and later at a department store, whose store manager was determined to be a representative of the institution’s athletics interests, otherwise known as a booster.
Former assistant coach A also provided impermissible transportation and lodging expenses for visits to campus for prospect 2, which resulted in two expense-paid campus visits for the recruit. Former assistant coach A reimbursed the recruit's grandmother for most of the cost of a rental car for the recruit ($168.68), paid for a hotel room for the recruit and his girlfriend, and also reimbursed his grandparents for cost of a hotel room.
These payments involved the coach giving the grandparents cash on two different occasions, in amounts of less than $170 and approximately $75, respectively. During prospect 2's official paid visit to campus, his student host also gave him $30 in cash, in violation of NCAA bylaws.
The committee also determined that another former assistant football coach (former assistant coach B) engaged in improper recruiting contacts and recruiting inducements with a different recruit (prospect 3). Former assistant coach B made impermissible telephone calls to prospect 3 and arranged to pay the cost of two high-school courses the recruit took at the Education Center in Jackson, Mississippi, in an effort to attain NCAA eligibility at Mississippi State.
Both the high-school assistant coach and former assistant coach B denied involvement in these activities. But the committee did not find their denials to be credible in light of the evidence.
The committee noted the high-school assistant coach attended Mississippi State and that he had close ties with the university’s football program, particularly former assistant coach B. University phone records also revealed calls from former assistant coach B to the high-school assistant coach at the high school but to no other coaches there. The committee concluded that the high school assistant coach’s involvement in the case caused him to become booster.
Other recruiting violations involved the following activities:
* Student-athlete hosts gave cash to prospects totaling $20 and $30 on two official paid visits during the 1999-00 and 2000-01 academic years.
* During another paid visit, a student-athlete host or another football-student athlete purchasing a pair of cross-trainer shoes for a recruit for about $50.
* The university reimbursed three prospective student-athletes for round-trip automobile expenses from Hamilton High School in Memphis, Tennessee, for their official visits in 2001-02 and 2002-03, even though their high-school head football coach used his vehicle to transport the recruits. The university paid $120.75 to one recruit and made payments of $132.86 each to two recruits. These violations were part of a pattern of recruiting violations and rose to the level of "major" when considered together, the committee said.
* From January 9-20, 2001, the general manager of a local hotel allowed two football recruits to stay at a hotel’s annex at no cost to them. The hotel was a representative of the university’s athletics interests (booster).
This case also involved a number of improper recruiting contacts with university boosters and prospective student-athletes. These contacts occurred from the fall of 1999 through January 2002. Specifically:
* In fall 1999, former assistant coach A invited a prospect and his parents to a hotel in Biloxi, Mississippi, for a dinner sponsored by either an alumni association or the university’s Bulldog Club. Former assistant coach A introduced the recruit and his parents to a number of individuals who were boosters, and they encouraged the recruit to attend Mississippi State.
* In January 2000, during an official paid visit, former assistant coach A introduced a recruit to a former Mississippi State football player who was a current player in the National Football League and a university booster. The conversation was approximately five minutes and took place at an off-campus restaurant where the university frequently took recruits and parents for meals.
* In summer 2000, during the university’s summer football camp, a then member of the football staff introduced two recruits to a booster. One of the recruits also met with the booster (representative B) at his office in the state capitol on two other occasions during that summer.
* In fall 2000, during an unofficial visit to watch a home football game, a student-athlete introduced a recruit to representative B.
* In January 2002, another recruit and his mother met with the president of a local bank who is a booster (representative C). Representative C told the recruit about his experiences at the university and said he hoped the prospect would enroll. Representative C knew the prospect was being recruited and had met earlier in the day with the former head coach and former assistant coaches A and B. Representative C assumed the coaches encouraged the recruit to meet with him.
In its public report, the committee noted that allegations against the former head coach were not found, including allegations of unethical conduct and that he offered a substantial recruiting inducement to a prospect and his family. The committee also noted that it did not find that former assistant coach B offered a substantial recruiting inducement to a prospect's family.
In determining the appropriate penalties to impose, the committee found that many of the violations in this case fell within the repeat violator timeframe from the previous case involving the football program.
"Of additional concern to the committee was that both the 1996 case and this case involved the football program and a coaching staff that should have been extra attentive to the heightened consequence a repeat violator faces if it is involved in major violations," the committee said. "Yet, as the record will indicate, the former football staff engaged in improper recruiting activities throughout this period, seemingly more concerned with purported conspiracies to discredit them by supports of rival teams, rather than with attentive compliance with the rules."
The committee considered the institution’s self-imposed penalties and corrective actions and has imposed the following penalties:
* Mississippi State University shall be publicly reprimanded and censured.
* The university is placed on four years of probation beginning June 12, 2004, and concluding on June 11, 2008, (four years from the date of the infractions hearing).
* The football team will end its 2004 season with the playing of its last regularly scheduled, in-season contest and is not eligible for postseason competition.
* The university is limited to 81 scholarships in football for the 2005-06 and 2006-07 academic years. The NCAA limit on football scholarships is 85. The university imposed a limit of 83 scholarships for 2005-06 only.
* The university is limited to 45 expense-paid visits to campus for recruits in football in the 2004-05 and 2005-06 academic years. The university may not "bank" any unused visits from those academic years and use them in subsequent years. NCAA rules allow up to 56 paid visits per year in football.
* Former assistant coaches A and B are subject to the "show cause" procedures in NCAA bylaws for a two-year period from June 12, 2004, to June 11, 2006. If they seek employment or affiliation in an athletically related position at NCAA member institutions during this two-year period, they and the involved institution must appear before the Committee on Infractions to determine if their athletically related duties should be limited.
During the period of probation, the university must do the following:
* Continue to develop and implement a comprehensive educational program on NCAA legislation, including seminars and testing, to instruct the coaches, the faculty athletics representative, all athletic department personnel and all university staff members with responsibility for the certification of student-athletes for admission, retention, financial aid or competition.
* Submit a preliminary report to the director of the NCAA Committee on Infractions by December 15, 2004, setting forth a schedule for establishing this compliance and educational program; and
* File with the committee’s director annual compliance reports indicating progress made with this program by June 15 of each year during the probationary period. Particular emphasis should be placed on adherence to NCAA recruiting legislation and educational efforts aimed at reducing recruiting violations. The reports must also include documentation of the university’s compliance with the penalties (adopted and) imposed by the committee.
* At the conclusion of the probationary period, the university’s president shall provide a letter to the committee affirming that the university’s current athletics policies and practices conform to all NCAA regulations.
As required for any institution involved in a major infractions case, Mississippi State University is subject to the repeat violator bylaw for a five-year period beginning on October 27, 2004, the effective date of the penalties in this case.
The members of the NCAA Committee on Infractions who heard this case are Thomas E. Yeager, committee chair and commissioner of the Colonial Athletic Association; Paul T. Dee, athletics director, University of Miami (Florida); Jack H. Friedenthal, law professor, George Washington University; Alfred J. Lechner, Jr., attorney, Morgan, Lewis & Bockius, Princeton, New Jersey; and Josephine R. Potuto, law professor, University of Nebraska, Lincoln.
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