The teleconference is just wrapping up, so we wanted to get you some information we found out this afternoon.
Coach Sampson, Athletic Director Rick Greenspan and Associate Athletic Director of Student Development and Compliance Grace Calhoun were on the phone today talking about the investigation conducted by Indianapolis law firm Ice Miller.
During a yearly routine check of compliance in July, some phone records showed that three-way calling occurred. This prompted and internal investigation from the IU athletics department. After talking to the coaches, Ice Miller was contacted for legal counsel and to conduct a full investigation.
There are two violations which resulted in 45 impermissible phone calls. The first problem was when Sampson participated in 10 three-way phone calls made throughout the 12 months Sampson was being sanction from the NCAA for violating phone rules in contacting recruits while coaching at Oklahoma. While three-way phone calls are not an outright NCAA violation, they were not allowed under Sampson's existing limitations. Sampson said he was unaware that 9 of the 10 calls were actually three-way calls. He said they occurred like this: Assistant Coach Rob Senderoff would call Recruit A telling Recruit A it would be a good time to call Sampson (which was allowed under the restrictions). Recruit A would be unable to contact Sampson, so he would call Senderoff back explaining the problem. Senderoff would connect the recruit to Sampson and then the phone call took place.
The second problem was the coaching staff, as a whole, made 35 more calls than allowed by NCAA rules, which is a secondary violation. Two separate reports were submitted to the NCAA, one for each situation.
The punishments from the athletic department are that Sampson will not receive a scheduled $500,000 raise for next year, losing a scholarship for the class of 2008-2009, and Senderoff will not be able to recruit off-campus nor make phone calls for a year. According to Calhoun, these punishments were consulted with legal counsel and are considered extreme, but necessary. While they could not comment on any further NCAA sanctions, it seemed that it would come as a surprise if there were any additional punishments.
But, that said, many people were surprised by the severity of the sanctions given to Sampson last year. Reports have been filed to the NCAA compliance office, so until any final word has been given, the possibility of further punishments lingers.
Sampson took full responsibility, but said that there was no malicious intent in these phone calls. Instead, he said it was an oversight by Senderoff and himself. Sampson said he was disappointed with his actions and said nothing less than 100 percent compliance was acceptable for the program. This is the first time that a IU basketball coach has been sanctioned for his actions while head coach at IU.
Mike will have a story in tomorrows paper and hopefully we can get some quotes up soon. So what do you think about this situation? Did the punishments fit the crime, or should further actions be taken? Will the loss of Senderoff on the recruiting trail hurt with high-profile targets Dexter Strickland and Lance Stephenson?
