NCAA again cites UNC athletics

Published May 23, 2015

by Jodi Leese Glusko, WRAL, May 22, 2015.

For the second time in five years, the NCAA on Friday delivered a Notice of Allegations to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. The notice is expected to outline NCAA findings about so-called "paper classes" at the school.

WRAL News has requested a copy of the document, but the university did not immediately release any details about its contents.

Chancellor Carol L. Folt and Director of Athletics Bubba Cunningham said the university was reviewing the notice.

“We take these allegations very seriously, and we will carefully evaluate them to respond within the NCAA’s 90-day deadline,” the pair said in a joint statement.

They promised that the document, minus redactions to protect student privacy, would be made public "as soon as possible."

The NCAA first began investigating Tar Heel athletic programs in the spring of 2010 on reports that football players were accepting money and gifts from agents and their representatives, in violation of amateurism rules.

It took almost two years for the NCAA to find academic improprieties, student-agent dealings and the acceptance of improper benefits and to punish the UNC football program with a bowl ban, a reduction in scholarships and a removal of 16 wins from the record books.

The university, prompted by revelations during that investigation about student-athletes who got help with papers and classes that never met, conducted several reviews of the then-Department of African and Afro-American Studies, eventually hiring Kenneth Wainstein, who worked in the U.S. Attorney General's Office, with a mandate to report on academic improprieties dating back to the early 1990s.

Wainstein found 169 student-athletes over the course of 18 years who benefited from classes that never met or had grades manipulated to keep them eligible.

Of the 169, 123 were football players, 15 were men's basketball players, eight were women's basketball players and 26 played in one of the Olympic sports.

Wainstein's findings brought the NCAA back to campus.

UNC has 90 days to respond to the Notice of Allegations and then faces a hearing with the NCAA Committee on Infractions. The committee, which includes representatives of other universities and select experts outside academia, then votes on any penalties to impose.

If the process follows the same pattern, it could be February or later before UNC learns the penalty for this round of violations. That uncertainty, according to some reports, has chilled recruits' interest in committing to play at UNC.

Read more at http://www.wralsportsfan.com/ncaa-again-finds-fault-with-unc-athletic-program/14663029/#P82ttEvLRWiAA5TQ.99