Princeton Tennis Rules Violation

N.C.A.A. Penalizes Princeton for a Major Rule Violation

Princeton University committed a major rule violation when a booster paid $33,000 toward the educational expenses of a tennis player, the N.C.A.A. announced Wednesday. It was the first time in 36 years that the N.C.A.A. found an Ivy League institution guilty of committing a major infraction.

The case involved a Princeton alumnus and former member of the men’s tennis team who helped pay a female tennis player’s tuition in the 2007-8 academic year and the fall of 2008. The alumnus and the student were not named. In addition to being publicly reprimanded, Princeton is required to vacate all tennis matches that the student won, in either singles or doubles, during the 2007-8 academic year and through part of the 2008 fall semester, when the violation was discovered. ...

How many of your peers do you trust?

Let's put it this way: There is more honor in politics. Here's the breakdown:

• Eight said flat-out no, they do not trust their peers.

"No, not at all. Maybe some of it is hearsay, but I don't trust them at all.''

• Five said they trust fewer than 10 of their colleagues.

"How many? Five,'' one coach said. Five percent? "No, five total,'' he said. "And those five are my assistants.''

How often during the recruitment of a player does someone -- a coach, a parent, someone else -- ask for something in return? How does it happen?

Here's where it really gets ugly. This hasn't happened to every coach (12 said they've faced it directly), but all 20 of them know it goes on.

"It happened to me this morning,'' one coach said. "I had a guy try to hand me a résumé, get them a job.

What is the biggest problem facing college basketball?

Finally, 100 percent consensus: It's agents and runners. Not only are they sullying the game, but they're also changing the way players look at their college careers.

That's no news flash. Agents have long been considered the boogeyman of college athletics. What's interesting? How they're doing business:

• Loans or lines of credit: "Say you've got a top-10 kid but you don't have a lot of money,'' one coach explained. "The agent will get a line of credit through his financial adviser for you in your name. When your kid goes pro, you pay it back.''

• Prepaid debit cards: Slightly different than a loan, these allow an agent to offer a constant stream of cash by giving a prospect or a prospect's family member a card with a cash value that can be constantly stuffed with more money, not unlike an actual bank account. The kicker: As of now, the NCAA has no way of tracking the transaction.

"That's the latest one I've heard,'' said one coach.

• Tying in to a summer league program: Numerous coaches said that agents now have ties to specific summer league teams and that the people serving as coaches are actually already agents' runners.

Another coach, who recently coached a top-five draft pick, said that every agent who came to sign his player offered the same thing: "If you sign with me, I'll deliver you this guy and that guy. Every single one of them is tied to an AAU team. Every one. They cook the deal with the AAU coach. He gets the kid on campus and then cuts a cut.''

• Hiring parents as "consultants": Shoe companies sponsor virtually every summer league team. The team wears the shoe company's gear and plays in the shoe company's sanctioned events.
"What's happening at Kentucky, all these one-and-dones, that's not good for our game,'' another added.

Robin Harris, the executive director of the Council of Ivy Group Presidents, which is the governing council of the Ivy League athletic conference, said that, based on the facts of the case, "the Ivy League does not anticipate conducting any further investigation or imposing any sanctions" beyond those announced by the NCAA.

"During the review of this violation, the University and Ivy League concluded that although the alumnus' contributions in support of the student-athlete's educational expenses violated NCAA rules, the violation was isolated and inadvertent, it did not provide the tennis team with a recruiting advantage, and the alumnus had no intention of providing the team with an advantage," Harris said.