The NCAA's Division I board of directors announced Wednesday that it will dissolve the Independent Accountability Resolution Process once its five remaining cases, including one involving the Arizona men's basketball program, are settled.Β
Formed in 2019 at the recommendation of the Commission on College Basketball, the IARP reviews the NCAA enforcement staffβs work, modifies or extends it as it deems fit, and then passes it on to a panel made up of five people with legal, higher education and/or sports backgrounds who are not affiliated with NCAA sports. The panel issues a decision that cannot be appealed.
The IARP started by taking on Memphis' infraction case in March 2020. N.C. State's case arrived a month later, then it was Kansas in July 2020, LSU in September 2020 and Arizona in December 2020. The sixth case, involving Louisville, was added in February 2021.
The IARP's glacial pace has frustrated some of the schools that have opted to go that route. And in January, the IARP announced it would stop taking new cases because, according to the NCAA, their open cases "required significant resources to bring those cases to resolution." NCAA President Mark Emmert said in April 2021 that he expected the open cases to be resolved within 12 months; they haven't been.
Arizona is facing five Level I charges. Three involve academic misconduct and improper recruiting inducements by two of ex-coach Sean Millerβs former assistants, Mark Phelps and Book Richardson; one says Miller failed to monitor his assistants; and the fifth says Arizona demonstrated a lack of institutional control.
The NCAA said Wednesday that discontinuing the IARP and modernizing the peer-review process will "streamline the overall infractions process and make better use of membership and national office resources."
The NCAA's new infractions policies, which also include clarifications that could reduce the number of appeals, will go into place Jan. 1. Click here to read more about the changes.
