for corruption.

"In court papers, prosecutors said the FBI has since 2015 been investigating the criminal influence of money on charges and student-athletes who participate in intercollegiate basketball governed by the NCAA."

Two of the four assistant coaches from P12 schools--Arizona and USC. Hmmm.

MSaviolives said:

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Two of the four assistant coaches from P12 schools--Arizona and USC. Hmmm.

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Auburn, OkStu, $uSC, uAz . . . east coast bias?

This is why I have given up on DI hoops. Football is next, I guess.

adidas' head of sports marketing is charged with "making and concealing bribe payments to high school student athletes and/or their families" to get the kids to sign with college teams identified as "University-6" and "University-7".

A player was allegedly paid "up to $150,000" to play at adidas-sponsored "University-7" and was expected to sign with an agent named in the indictment and adidas once he turned pro.

Louisville's also implicated. Allegedly an agent gave the family of a late 2017 recruit, Brian Bowen, $100K to attend Lville, an Adidas school. If that's proven, don't see how Pitino survives, given his prior screw ups at Lville.

Adidas is the one named, but there's another apparel company mentioned that was apparently in a bidding was with Adidas for a player. Given the other schools in trouble, maybe Nike?

socaliganbear said:

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Adidas is the one named, but there's another apparel company mentioned that was apparently in a bidding was with Adidas for a player. Given the other schools in trouble, maybe Nike?

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Auburn is UA. From my reading, there are a few different things going on here. There appears to be some funneling kids to Adidas schools but separately, shenanigans with agents and the role that these coaches and others play in that.

USC may be in a world on hurt. Not only is Bland the straw that stirs that drink from a recruiting standpoint, USC was already on sanctions a few years with the OJ Mayo scandal that involved similar issues with a promoter, a handler and Mayo's family. This is gonna get very interesting. One thing is for sure: football and basketball recruiting has become a total cesspool and the NCAA is totally unable to deal with it.

TheSouseFamily said:

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socaliganbear said:

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Adidas is the one named, but there's another apparel company mentioned that was apparently in a bidding was with Adidas for a player. Given the other schools in trouble, maybe Nike?

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Auburn is UA. From my reading, there are a few different things going on here. There appears to be some funneling kids to Adidas schools but separately, shenanigans with agents and the role that these coaches and others play in that.

USC may be in a world on hurt. Not only is Bland the straw that stirs that drink from a recruiting standpoint, USC was already on sanctions a few years with the OJ Mayo scandal that involved similar issues with a promoter, a handler and Mayo's family. This is gonna get very interesting. One thing is for sure: football and basketball recruiting has become a total cesspool and the NCAA is totally unable to deal with it.

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That was a different coaching regime at USC, but yes, this isn't the first time they've paid street agents and shoe company reps to get players.

How far back does this investigation reach? Bland was the top recruiter at SDSU before moving to USC.

Quote:

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In the first 10 years of the Fisher era, the Aztecs signed only one player out of high school rated in the top 100 by one of the major recruiting services, forward Marcus Slaughter in 2003. (Evan Burns, a five-star prospect, signed with UCLA before coming to SDSU).

In the last five years, they have landed five, beginning with Kawhi Leonard in 2009 and including the recent commitments of Kell and Pope. Cheatham would be the sixth.

"There's nothing wrong with the way we've done it," Fisher said.

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Well, coach, the FBI and the Department of Justice might have something to say about that....

BearSD - Different regime, yes. But when the NCAA doles out punishment, repeat offending becomes a serious consideration. There's a repeat offender window but I'm not sure what it is now.

It will be very interesting to see what the NCAA does. Existential issue here. LOTS of schools and more importantly 2 very blood blue bloods between UofA and Kentucky. Clearly the argument here will be that the institution couldn't have know (wink wink nudge nudge) but if the NCAA had balls it would say "your employee, you own it." But as we saw with strippergate - that isn't necessarily the case.

Think it only goes back to 2015. So Bland's dealings at SDSU should be in the clear.

TheSouseFamily said:

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BearSD - Different regime, yes. But when the NCAA doles out punishment, repeat offending becomes a serious consideration. There's a repeat offender window but I'm not sure what it is now.

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That's right, they can add extra punishment to a program for violations committed while under probation for earlier violations. It might help USC that the perpetrators in this case are a different cast of characters than the guys who paid to get Mayo.

Either way, having an assistant coach behind bars and under federal indictment for what he did to get players to USC is a bad look.

This might get even more interesting when these guys start trying to cut deals by implicating bigger fish...

here's yahoos front page link about this

https://www.yahoo.com/sports/fbi-probe-uncovers-massive-college-basketball-scandal-snaring-big-time-programs-144631716.html

You have to wonder if the NCAA will show some guts and Death Penalty Louisville. One HAS to believe that Patino is gone. Indictment flat out says bribe to get a recruit to sign.

NCAA only care about money and have never been able to make college sports fair or clean.
They never reform
Money continues to dictate
Hopefully this spurs positive change

Wonder how this ended up being investigated by the US Attorney of the southern district of NY (Manhattan)? They are no joke. Probably started out in their financial crimes division and ballooned from there.

NYCGOBEARS said:

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Wonder how this ended up being investigated by the US Attorney of the southern district of NY (Manhattan)? They are no joke. Probably started out in their financial crimes division and ballooned from there.

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In the press conference, the US Atty mentioned that they caught someone who was involved in this stuff, flipped him in exchange for becoming an informant, wearing a wire and getting all these guys on tape.

He also mentioned that the NCAA wasn't aware of the investigation til today.

NYCGOBEARS said:

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Wonder how this ended up being investigated by the US Attorney of the southern district of NY (Manhattan)? They are no joke. Probably started out in their financial crimes division and ballooned from there.

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Article says they got a guy on securities fraud who flipped.

Quote:

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Using a "cooperating witness" who is described as operating an athlete management business (a financial planner who handled the money for pro athletes), the FBI was able to get an undercover agent into hotel rooms, meetings and deals. In 2016, the cooperating witness was accused of committing securities fraud, according to the complaints, and presumably flipped after that.

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https://sports.yahoo.com/fbi-probe-uncovers-massive-college-basketball-scandal-snaring-big-time-programs-144631716.html

NYCGOBEARS said:

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Wonder how this ended up being investigated by the US Attorney of the southern district of NY (Manhattan)? They are no joke. Probably started out in their financial crimes division and ballooned from there.

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Speculation is that the bribes the players were getting invalidated the Pell Grants they also got which is a Federal crime...

Quote:

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Prosecutors allege Bland met with former sports agent Christian Dawkins and an undercover FBI agent on July 29 in a Las Vegas hotel room. Bland said any university players whom he controlled would be "coming to" Dawkins. The coach added he had "heavy influence" over his school's players choosing agents and advisors. They discussed the need to "take care of" two USC players referred to in the complaint as Player-8 and Player-9.

In the room, Dawkins took an envelope containing $13,000 and said he would give it to Bland. The two men left the room together.

Prosecutors also charged Bland with facilitating payments of $9,000 to families of two USC basketball players using cash-filled envelopes.

During a meeting on USC's campus Aug. 31 recorded by an undercover FBI agent, Bland told Dawkins, the agent and another man that if they continued to fund the families of USC players and recruits, the coach would ensure the players would use Dawkins as an agent.

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from http://www.latimes.com/sports/usc/la-sp-usc-tony-bland-20170926-story.html

This is YUGE!!! Thanks guys.

More than a decade ago the NCAA had tapes, receipts, photos and the like that implicated about 20 of the top 25 football teams: and did nothing. The NCAA has no interest in "cleaning" up college sports, only in making money. Agents have been paying high school players and their families, through "AAU" programs for decades.

bearchamp said:

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More than a decade ago the NCAA had tapes, receipts, photos and the like that implicated about 20 of the top 25 football teams: and did nothing. The NCAA has no interest in "cleaning" up college sports, only in making money. Agents have been paying high school players and their families, through "AAU" programs for decades.

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this is different..this isn't the NCAA..this is the Feds...haha. They don't lose often.

According to the FBI the NCAA didn't even know about the investigation until today. They clearly don't think much of them.

Where is Shocky to pile on Arizona hoops getting caught up in this?

Hold on to yer jorts people!!!

hehe this could get big. Feds have a way of making people squeel.

So who are the likely recruits that were involved at Arizona and SC?

This is bad. And looks even worse that the NCAA has allowed this to go on. I'm not sure how the offending schools survive something this blatantly corrupt. Not sure how Addidas survives this either.

"[Sean] Miller is referenced in a wiretapped call by Richardson as wanting a player 'badly' which led to a $5k payment to the player during an on campus visit. At the minimum that is a blatant 'failure to monitor' violation for Miller."

I'm really really hoping we don't get caught up in this.

According to CBS:

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• Schools are not on the hook, according to United States Attorney Joon Kim. The assistants at USC, Arizona, Oklahoma State and Auburn are all implicated, but neither the schools themselves -- nor the head coaches at those schools -- have been levied with any allegations.

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https://www.cbssports.com/college-basketball/news/explaining-the-fbi-probe-and-the-corruption-scandal-rocking-college-basketball/

But that is from a criminal investigation perspective. This could be the launching point for the NCAA, which addresses, among other things, institutional control issues.

TheSouseFamily said:

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"[Sean] Miller is referenced in a wiretapped call by Richardson as wanting a player 'badly' which led to a $5k payment to the player during an on campus visit. At the minimum that is a blatant 'failure to monitor' violation for Miller."

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Apologies as I may have missed it. What article are you quoting above?

One suspects this type of thing is going on all the time, at large and small scales, in D1 sports. It is like the PED situation--once coaches know that competing programs are doing it (and I am guessing that there are constant rumors and indications of this) they realize that they "need" to do something similar in order to be competitive. Makes it a hard business. I am guessing that Monty's abrupt retirement was related in part to his disgust with the situation (just a guess, but his disgust with recruiting generally was obvious and it fits with this supposition).