SYRACUSE, N.Y. — Syracuse University (SU) took issue with “certain findings” in the report that the NCAA Division I Committee on Infractions released on Friday, its leader said.
Specifically, SU “strongly disagrees” that it “failed to maintain institutional control over its athletics programs,” or that men’s basketball head coach Jim Boeheim “has taken actions that justify a finding that he was responsible for the rules violations.” That’s according to a letter that Chancellor Kent Syverud wrote to the SU community, and the school posted on its website on Friday.
SU is considering whether it will appeal “certain portions” of the NCAA decision. Boeheim “may choose to appeal the portions of the decision that impact him personally.”
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“Should he decide to do so, we would support him in this step,” Syverud wrote.
The school takes the NCAA report and the issues it identifies “very seriously, particularly those that involve academic integrity and the overall well-being of student-athletes,” the letter stated.
Syracuse University regrets, and does not dispute, that “significant violations” that the NCAA cited occurred, Syverud said.
SU said it believes the NCAA’s investigation has taken longer than “any other investigation in NCAA history.”
The entire process has continued for close to eight years and involved a review of conduct dating back to 2001, Syverud wrote.
“By comparison, the investigation into the fixing of the 1919 World Series took two months and the 2007 investigation of steroid use in baseball took 21 months,” he said.
Reaction to findings
SU in the timeframe between 2004 and 2005 discovered that a part-time local YMCA employee provided two men’s basketball players and three football players a combined total of $8,335. The YMCA employee qualified under NCAA rules as an SU athletics “booster.”
These monies were purportedly for work done at the YMCA, such as refereeing youth basketball games.
Despite that, the payments were prohibited “extra benefits” under NCAA rules, and, “they never should have occurred,” the Syverud letter said.
In addition, three of these student-athletes received academic credit in the same course for internships at the YMCA that “they failed to complete.”
SU rescinded the credit, Syverud said.
Drug program
SU also reported to the NCAA that “at times,” the school “failed to follow” the written terms of its voluntarily-adopted drug education and deterrence program regarding student-athletes who tested positive for use of marijuana.
The violations occurred in the time frame between 2001 through early 2009.
These “failures” were “largely” the result of an “unnecessarily complicated” testing policy and “did not involve performance-enhancing drugs,” but they constitute an NCAA violation, which SU accepts, according to the Syverud letter.
Academic integrity
SU also reported that a men’s basketball player in January 2012 “committed academic misconduct.”
The misconduct occurred when the player submitted a paper in a course he already passed “in an effort to improve his course grade and restore NCAA eligibility.”
The ability to improve a previous grade is open to all SU students, Syverud said.
Two (now former) athletics employees, both of whom “were aware their actions were improper and wrong” helped prepare the paper, the chancellor wrote.
Their actions, “done in secret, went against clear instructions” that the student-athlete needed to complete the assignment on his own, and constituted a clear violation of both SU academic-integrity policy and NCAA rules, Syverud said.
The school has acknowledged the now-former staff members’ “wrongful conduct and accepts responsibility” for their actions.
While reviewing the matter, SU found information suggesting these same two individuals, and one tutor, “may have assisted” three other student-athletes with some academic assignments.
Detailed information was submitted through the university’s faculty-led academic integrity process, Syverud wrote.
In each case, faculty “failed to find evidence supporting a violation.”
NCAA bylaws dictate that they must accept an institution’s academic-integrity determinations, the chancellor added.
The NCAA also determined the same conduct constituted an “extra benefit” to these student-athletes, but SU disagrees with the NCAA’s position.
The mistakes “must never happen again,” Syveerud wrote. SU beginning in 2009 “strengthened its policies and reformed a range of student-athlete support services.”
Contact Reinhardt at ereinhardt@cnybj.com
