The NCAA announced Friday that Oklahoma State has been banned from the 2020-21 NCAA Tournament after then-assistant coach Lamont Evans pled guilty to accepting $22,000 in bribes, in a case that has parallels to Arizona's NCAA investigation.
The NCAA ruled that Evans accepted between $18,100 and $22,000 in bribes from two financial advisors to influence athletes as part of "a broader scheme that involved money and influence at the intersection of college and professional basketball," referring to the federal investigation into college basketball.
Then-UA assistant coach Book Richardson pled guilty to accepting $20,000 in bribes after he was charged and fired as a result of the September 2017 federal complaint.
The NCAA also significantly added to self-imposed penalties that Oklahoma State had proposed. The full penalties also include:
- Three years of probation.
- A $10,000 fine plus 1% of the men’s basketball program budget (self-imposed by the university).
- Three total scholarships eliminated during the 2020-21 through 2022-23 academic years.
- Reduction of men’s basketball official visits to 25 during the 2018-19/2019-20 rolling two-year period and to 18 during the 2019-20/2020-21 rolling two-year period (self-imposed by the university).
- No unofficial recruiting visits for two weeks during the fall of 2020 and two weeks during the fall of 2021 (self-imposed by the university). The university also must prohibit unofficial visits for three additional weeks during the fall of 2020, 2021 and/or 2022.
- No telephone recruiting for a one-week period during the 2020-21 academic year (self-imposed by the university). The university also must prohibit telephone recruiting for six additional weeks during the probation period.
- Twelve fewer staff recruiting person days during the 2019-20 academic year (self-imposed by the university). The university also must reduce the number of recruiting person days by five during the 2020-21 academic year.
- A 10-year show-cause order for Evans (in which any NCAA school employing him must restrict him from any athletically related duties unless it shows cause why the restrictions should not apply.)
- Three consecutive days staffers cannot take part in off-campus evaluations during the summer evaluation period in in 2020 (self-imposed by the university but also not happening anyway until at least August).
Arizona is considerably behind Oklahoma State in the enforcement process. Oklahoma State received its initial notice of allegations in November, and was expected to respond by February, with the NCAA issuing its rulings Friday.
Arizona has been under NCAA investigation at least since the school acknowledged it was underway in May 2019, but has not yet received a notice of allegations.
