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For Immediate Release

Wednesday, December 15, 2010

Contact(s)

Stacey Osburn
Associate Director of Public and Media Relations
317/917-6117

INDIANAPOLIS---The NCAA Division I Committee on Infractions has penalized Arizona State University for major and secondary violations in its baseball program. The committee noted this case is the university’s ninth major infractions case, the most of any NCAA member school.

This case involves a series of violations that occurred over more than five years, which consisted primarily of recruiting infractions, including the use of an impermissible recruiter and excessive phone calls. There were also violations involving coaching staff limits and paying student-athletes for work not performed. The committee determined there was a lack of institutional control and a failure by the former head coach to promote an atmosphere for compliance.

“The violations were the result of poor record keeping, failure to monitor and a cavalier attitude on the part of the former head baseball coach to NCAA regulations,” the committee noted in its report. Further, the committee report notes that the university did not self-detect any of the violations in this case.

Penalties, including those self-imposed by the university, are three years probation, a ban on postseason baseball competition in 2011, scholarship reductions, a vacation of wins, recruiting restrictions and limitations on coaching activity during practice. The former head coach also received a one-year show-cause penalty, which outlines how his athletic duties must be limited at his present or future employing institutions. The public report further details these limitations.

Over a five-year period, the former head coach and several former assistant baseball coaches made more than 500 impermissible recruiting calls. The majority of these calls were a violation of the NCAA one-call-per-week rule and approximately 25 of the calls were placed before prospective student-athletes’ junior year in high school. According to the committee, it was difficult to determine precisely how many impermissible recruiting calls were made. This was because the former head coach did not accurately document his recruiting telephone calls, nor did he require his staff to do so, even though he was instructed by the compliance staff to maintain precise records.

The committee also found that the former head coach violated several rules related to the recruitment of one particular prospective student-athlete in fall 2006. Along with placing impermissible phone calls, the former head coach directed a baseball team manager to recruit the prospect, who the team manager had coached at his two-year institution. This recruitment activity included phone calls and in-person, off-campus contact, even though the team manager was not an authorized recruiter for the school.

In addition, the former head coach requested four student-athletes to decrease all or a portion of their athletic scholarship during the academic year so that it could be provided to new or incoming student-athletes, including the prospect. Generally, NCAA rules do not allow institutions to terminate their scholarships in the middle of an academic year and they do not allow a coach to request that a student-athlete return a portion of their scholarship during the academic year.

From the 2004-05 academic year through 2007-08, the former head coach employed several individuals who engaged in on-field coaching duties during practices and prior to contests, which violated NCAA rules limiting the number of countable coaches.

From the spring of 2004 through the spring of 2008, the university used the staff of a privately-owned training facility located on campus to conduct physical conditioning activities with numerous baseball student-athletes without including the private facility’s staff in the limitations on the number of coaches. This constituted an extra benefit for those student-athletes who used the services, as they were not required to pay for this training. The total value of the benefits was approximately $60,000.

Further, between September 2006 and November 2007, 20 baseball student-athletes employed by the former head coach’s own nonprofit organization received $5,889.34 for work they did not perform. The student-athletes received unearned wages when the former head coach’s director of administration for the youth program recorded a predetermined amount of hours into the spreadsheet for student-athletes without regard for whether the recorded time reflected the actual amount of hours worked. 

The committee stated in its report, “While the institution always has a duty to monitor student-athlete employment, a head coach, when employing his own student-athletes, has his own duty to ensure the employment arrangement is permissible.”

The committee found the former head coach failed to promote an atmosphere for compliance for his lack of oversight and disregard of NCAA rules in this case.

The committee also found the university violated the principles of institutional control for a failure to ensure adequate systems to monitor for rules compliance and provide adequate NCAA rules education for the baseball program.

The penalties, some of which were self-imposed by the institution and adopted by the committee, are below. Additional details are available in the public report.

• Public reprimand and censure.
• Three years of probation (December 15, 2010, to December 14, 2013).
• One-year show-cause penalty for the former head coach (December 15, 2010, to December 14, 2011).
• The university is not eligible to participate in any postseason baseball competition following the conclusion of the 2011 regular season (“championship segment”).
• Reduction in baseball athletic scholarships by 2.0 for one year at the first opportunity, but no later than 2011-12 (self-imposed by the university).
• Vacation of all wins during the 2007 baseball season, including conference championships and College World Series games. Additional details are available in the public report (self-imposed by the university).
• Limit of nine official paid visits for the 2010-11 academic year (self-imposed by the university).
• The former head coach was prohibited from making any telephone recruiting calls during the first two weeks of September 2008 and from participating in the first three practices of fall 2008 (self-imposed by the university).
• Reduced by one of the number of baseball coaches allowed to recruit off-campus for one week during the fall 2008 contact period (self-imposed by the university).
• Reduced by one the number of baseball coaches allowed to participate in practice activities during the 45 days of practice in fall 2008 (self-imposed by the university).
• No recruiting telephone calls were made by baseball staff members during July 2010 and July 2011 (self-imposed by the university).
• Reduced the number of coaches participating in off-campus recruiting for baseball from three to two for the 2010-11 academic year (self-imposed by the university).
• The committee commends the current head baseball coach for discontinuing the program where student-athletes were asked to relinquish all or portions of their financial aid for incoming student-athletes. The committee requires the university to cease this practice on a permanent basis.

The members of the Committee on Infractions who reviewed this case include Paul Dee, lecturer of law and education at the University of Miami and formerly the institution's athletics director and general counsel. He was the chair of the Committee on Infractions when this case was heard. Other members are Roscoe C. Howard, Jr., attorney; John Black, attorney; Andrea Myers, athletics director emeritus, Indiana State University; Eleanor Myers, faculty athletics representative and law professor at Temple University; and Britton Banowsky, commissioner of Conference USA.