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- Nov 2, 2011
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Penalties in a new enforcement structure pack a punch
Among the most frequently stated reasons for the new enforcement structure the Division I Board of Directors
adopted in October was the need to squelch the “risk/reward” analysis NCAA members believed some people
were conducting as they weighed the consequences of violating bylaws.
Now that the new structure is poised to be implemented this August, among the most frequently stated reactions
to it is how its penalty guidelines will make potential rule-breakers realize there’s no reward for the risk.
Seeking stronger sanctions and a clearer “if you do this, then you can expect that” model for violations and penalties,
the Enforcement Working Group developed a matrix that succinctly lays out the consequences that can be expected for various breaches of conduct.
While it wasn’t designed as a scare tactic per se, it figures to be persuasive.
“It was clear we needed to have stiffer and more predictable penalties so that people who were doing the
‘risk-reward’ calculation would think twice whether it was in their interests to engage in bad behavior,” said working
group chair Ed Ray, the president at Oregon State University. “Having penalty guidelines – and having the penalties
that are in those guidelines be more severe than what we have now – was a good way of sending clear signals to people.”
Ed Ray
The penalty guidelines signal stringent change, indeed. For the most serious conduct breaches, violators can expect as
a matter of course penalties like a one- or two-year postseason ban, a fine of $5,000 plus 1 to 3 percent of the total
budget for the affected sports program (which could be a significant dollar amount), and scholarship reductions by
percentage rather than number, up to 25 percent of the scholarship allocations in the affected sport.
An array of other penalties exist as well, including head coach suspensions and show-cause orders, and limits on
recruiting visits and other contact with recruits. Those are all laid out in the matrix, too.
And those are just for cases deemed as “standard” in a given category. If there are aggravating factors, it’s
“violator beware,” as the severity of sanctions magnify in each category.
While it may appear at first glance that the working group made all of these decisions on its own, the fact is that
the group was reacting to membership demand.
“We wanted to give some guidance on where the membership is right now on what they expect from our enforcement program.
And where they are right now is that they want to see tougher penalties and they want more clarity on what the penalties
are likely to be,” said Ivy League Executive Director Robin Harris.
Robin Harris
Harris is among 13 members of the working group composed of presidents, athletics directors, commissioners and others
assigned after NCAA President Mark Emmert assembled more than 50 presidents at a retreat in August 2011.
Among the outcomes was a call for a more stringent and efficient enforcement structure to uphold the integrity of the collegiate model of athletics.
The working group surveyed the membership from the start and quickly encountered a “we’re not going to take it anymore” kind of response.
Harris said the “risk/reward” analysis was a recurring theme.
“We kept hearing stories about people researching past cases and judging whether the risk of being caught was worth it,” she said.
“They could cite teams in the past that had been caught but had rebounded pretty quickly. So there was a sense from the working
group that we needed to ratchet up the penalties.”
Thus, while postseason bans, scholarship reductions, fines and recruiting limits have always been in the Committee on Infractions’ ****nal,
the length of those bans and the severity of the withholdings are much greater in the new structure.
“Coming out of the presidential retreat, our marching orders were to make the penalties more stringent and more consistent,”
said working group member Eleanor Myers, the faculty athletics representative at Temple University and a current member of
the Committee on Infractions. “And you can’t really do either of those without a guideline or matrix. But getting the proper
range of sanctions and filling in those boxes on the matrix became very important.”
The working group got help in that regard from the membership survey, which clearly indicated that postseason bans and
scholarship reductions were considered the most influential deterrents.
Postseason competition is such a reward for teams – the school receives publicity for it and coaches often receive bonuses for achieving it.
Taking all of that away, particularly for multiple years, is significant.
Scholarship reductions have a longer-term effect, especially with the percentage model in the new matrix.
Harris in fact said that in her experience with the Committee on Infractions, which she worked with when she was an
NCAA staff member in the 1990s, strict scholarship reductions had a longer-term impact than postseason bans.
-read more
Level I: Severe breach of conduct
Violations that seriously undermine or threaten the integrity of the NCAA collegiate model as set forth in the Constitution and bylaws,
including any violation that provides or is intended to provide a substantial or extensive recruiting, competitive or other advantage,
or a substantial or extensive impermissible benefit.
Level II: Significant breach of conduct
Violations that provide or are intended to provide more than a minimal but less than a substantial or extensive recruiting,
competitive or other advantage; includes more than a minimal but less than a substantial or extensive impermissible benefit;
or involves conduct that may compromise the integrity of the NCAA collegiate model as set forth in the Constitution and bylaws.
Level III: Breach of conduct
Violations that are isolated or limited in nature; provide no more than a minimal recruiting, competitive or other advantage;
and do not include more than a minimal impermissible benefit. Multiple Level IV violations may collectively be considered a breach of conduct.
Level IV: Incidental issues
Minor infractions that are inadvertent and isolated, technical in nature and result in a negligible, if any, competitive advantage.
Level IV infractions generally will not affect eligibility for intercollegiate athletics. (This level may be revised or even eliminated
pending outcomes from the Rules Working Group’s efforts to streamline the Division I Manual.)
At its core, the new enforcement structure:
Among the most frequently stated reasons for the new enforcement structure the Division I Board of Directors
adopted in October was the need to squelch the “risk/reward” analysis NCAA members believed some people
were conducting as they weighed the consequences of violating bylaws.
Now that the new structure is poised to be implemented this August, among the most frequently stated reactions
to it is how its penalty guidelines will make potential rule-breakers realize there’s no reward for the risk.
Seeking stronger sanctions and a clearer “if you do this, then you can expect that” model for violations and penalties,
the Enforcement Working Group developed a matrix that succinctly lays out the consequences that can be expected for various breaches of conduct.
While it wasn’t designed as a scare tactic per se, it figures to be persuasive.
“It was clear we needed to have stiffer and more predictable penalties so that people who were doing the
‘risk-reward’ calculation would think twice whether it was in their interests to engage in bad behavior,” said working
group chair Ed Ray, the president at Oregon State University. “Having penalty guidelines – and having the penalties
that are in those guidelines be more severe than what we have now – was a good way of sending clear signals to people.”
Ed Ray
The penalty guidelines signal stringent change, indeed. For the most serious conduct breaches, violators can expect as
a matter of course penalties like a one- or two-year postseason ban, a fine of $5,000 plus 1 to 3 percent of the total
budget for the affected sports program (which could be a significant dollar amount), and scholarship reductions by
percentage rather than number, up to 25 percent of the scholarship allocations in the affected sport.
An array of other penalties exist as well, including head coach suspensions and show-cause orders, and limits on
recruiting visits and other contact with recruits. Those are all laid out in the matrix, too.
And those are just for cases deemed as “standard” in a given category. If there are aggravating factors, it’s
“violator beware,” as the severity of sanctions magnify in each category.
While it may appear at first glance that the working group made all of these decisions on its own, the fact is that
the group was reacting to membership demand.
“We wanted to give some guidance on where the membership is right now on what they expect from our enforcement program.
And where they are right now is that they want to see tougher penalties and they want more clarity on what the penalties
are likely to be,” said Ivy League Executive Director Robin Harris.
Robin Harris
Harris is among 13 members of the working group composed of presidents, athletics directors, commissioners and others
assigned after NCAA President Mark Emmert assembled more than 50 presidents at a retreat in August 2011.
Among the outcomes was a call for a more stringent and efficient enforcement structure to uphold the integrity of the collegiate model of athletics.
The working group surveyed the membership from the start and quickly encountered a “we’re not going to take it anymore” kind of response.
Harris said the “risk/reward” analysis was a recurring theme.
“We kept hearing stories about people researching past cases and judging whether the risk of being caught was worth it,” she said.
“They could cite teams in the past that had been caught but had rebounded pretty quickly. So there was a sense from the working
group that we needed to ratchet up the penalties.”
Thus, while postseason bans, scholarship reductions, fines and recruiting limits have always been in the Committee on Infractions’ ****nal,
the length of those bans and the severity of the withholdings are much greater in the new structure.
“Coming out of the presidential retreat, our marching orders were to make the penalties more stringent and more consistent,”
said working group member Eleanor Myers, the faculty athletics representative at Temple University and a current member of
the Committee on Infractions. “And you can’t really do either of those without a guideline or matrix. But getting the proper
range of sanctions and filling in those boxes on the matrix became very important.”
The working group got help in that regard from the membership survey, which clearly indicated that postseason bans and
scholarship reductions were considered the most influential deterrents.
Postseason competition is such a reward for teams – the school receives publicity for it and coaches often receive bonuses for achieving it.
Taking all of that away, particularly for multiple years, is significant.
Scholarship reductions have a longer-term effect, especially with the percentage model in the new matrix.
Harris in fact said that in her experience with the Committee on Infractions, which she worked with when she was an
NCAA staff member in the 1990s, strict scholarship reductions had a longer-term impact than postseason bans.
-read more
Level I: Severe breach of conduct
Violations that seriously undermine or threaten the integrity of the NCAA collegiate model as set forth in the Constitution and bylaws,
including any violation that provides or is intended to provide a substantial or extensive recruiting, competitive or other advantage,
or a substantial or extensive impermissible benefit.
Level II: Significant breach of conduct
Violations that provide or are intended to provide more than a minimal but less than a substantial or extensive recruiting,
competitive or other advantage; includes more than a minimal but less than a substantial or extensive impermissible benefit;
or involves conduct that may compromise the integrity of the NCAA collegiate model as set forth in the Constitution and bylaws.
Level III: Breach of conduct
Violations that are isolated or limited in nature; provide no more than a minimal recruiting, competitive or other advantage;
and do not include more than a minimal impermissible benefit. Multiple Level IV violations may collectively be considered a breach of conduct.
Level IV: Incidental issues
Minor infractions that are inadvertent and isolated, technical in nature and result in a negligible, if any, competitive advantage.
Level IV infractions generally will not affect eligibility for intercollegiate athletics. (This level may be revised or even eliminated
pending outcomes from the Rules Working Group’s efforts to streamline the Division I Manual.)
At its core, the new enforcement structure:
- Introduces a four-tier violation hierarchy that ranges from severe breaches of conduct to incidental infractions.The structure, which replaces the current two-tier approach (major and secondary violations), is designed to focus most on conduct breaches that seriously undermine or threaten the integrity of the NCAA Constitution (Levels I and II in the accompanying list).
- Enhances head coach responsibility/accountability and potential consequences for head coaches who fail to direct their staffs and student-athletes to uphold NCAA bylaws. Penalties include imposed suspensions that can range from 10 percent of the season to an entire season.
- Increases the Division I Committee on Infractions from 10 to as many as 24 voting members from which smaller panels will be assembled to review cases more quickly and efficiently.
- Continues to offer harsh consequences (postseason bans, scholarship reductions, recruiting limits, head coach suspensions, show-cause orders and financial penalties) that align more predictably with the severity of the violations. The new penalty structure also places a premium on aggravating and mitigating circumstances in each case.
- Emphasizes a culture among head coaches, the compliance community, institutional leadership and conferences to assume a shared responsibility for upholding the values of intercollegiate athletics.
- Conduct breaches that occurred before Oct. 30, 2012 and are processed before Aug. 1, 2013 will be subject to the current process and penalties.
- Conduct breaches that occurred before Oct. 30, 2012 but are processed after Aug. 1, 2013 would be subject to the new process but would incur the more lenient of the two penalty structures (current and revised).
- Conduct breaches that occurred during a span that includes both before and after Oct. 30, 2012 and are processed after Aug. 1, 2013 will be subject to new process and the revised penalties as long as most of the violations occurred after Oct. 30, 2012.
- Conduct breaches that occur after Oct. 30, 2012 and are processed after Aug. 1, 2013 will be subject to both the new process and the revised penalty structure.
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