Three large blocks of bold and italicized text greet you within the pages of the NCAA’s decision in the infractions case concerning recruiting violations around Miami’s women’s basketball program.
Yes, the NCAA found violations, headlined by the winningest head coach in program history (Katie Meier) facilitating impermissible contact between two prospective athletes (Fresno State transfers Haley and Hanna Cavinder) and a well-known Hurricanes booster (John Ruiz).
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The penalties are rather minor: One year of probation. Tens of thousands of dollars. A handful of lost official visits, and some lost in-person recruiting days.
But the case was resolved with no penalties for the players involved. And no penalties for the booster with deep pockets who met with those players before they ultimately committed to the Hurricanes, either.
That last bit is what fans and administrators alike will focus on as they sift through the news of the Division I Committee on Infractions’ first NIL-adjacent decision to be resolved since relaxed NIL rules ushered in a new era of college sports. Many will feel that the light penalty will amount to nothing more than a slap on the wrist.
This is what compelled the Committee on Infractions to include the bolded and italicized passage. The three-person COI panel did accept the negotiated resolution that led to the above penalties, but also noted the following:
The panel was troubled by the limited nature and severity of institutional penalties agreed-upon by Miami and the enforcement staff namely, the absence of a disassociation of the involved booster. Further, this case was processed prior to the adoption of NCAA Bylaw 19.7.3, which went into effect on January 1, 2023, and presumes that a violation occurred in cases involving name, image and likeness offers, agreements and/or activities. Based on legislation in effect at the time of submission, the panel cannot presume that activities around name, image and likeness resulted in NCAA violations.
Although the parties asserted that a disassociation penalty would be inappropriate based on an impermissible meal and an impermissible contact, today’s new NIL-related environment represents a new day. Boosters are involved with prospects and student-athletes in ways the NCAA membership has never seen or encountered. In that way, addressing impermissible booster conduct is critical, and the disassociation penalty presents an effective penalty available to the COI.
“We didn’t want to put a green light on (that behavior),” COI chair Dave Roberts, USC’s special assistant to the athletic director, told The Athletic.
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But wait. Doesn’t this decision represent a green light? If the booster isn’t punished? If the players remain eligible? If the NCAA was unable to prove that NIL was a recruiting inducement?
“Not with that header on it,” Roberts said.
“Not with that header,” repeated the panel’s chief hearing officer, University of Akron president Gary Miller.
“I think that’s a pretty good stop sign,” Roberts said. “You better be thinking before you do something.”
That was the intention behind the bold type, Miller said. This decision needed it because everyone in the room could predict what others would think when they read it.
The COI members believe in the message they’re trying to send for two reasons. The first: The new “NIL presumption” bylaw introduced this year is designed to move the burden of proof from the NCAA’s enforcement staff (which previously had to prove a violation occurred) to the member school accused of rule-breaking (which will now have to prove that no violation occurred). The second reason: The COI didn’t really have the chance to make an example of John Ruiz, the booster in the Miami women’s basketball case. Because it was a negotiated resolution, the decision came to the COI essentially pre-packaged. The school, the coach and the enforcement staff had already agreed upon facts tied to the violations and the penalties associated with them.
Although the COI did approve the negotiated resolution — the committee has approved all but three that have come across its desk in the last couple of years — “it’s not a rubber stamp,” Roberts said. The panel overseeing the decision can only reject a negotiated resolution agreement if the decision is not in the best interest of NCAA membership or if the penalties are “manifestly unreasonable.”
“We do have the ability to send the case back to enforcement and the parties and say re-charge it, but it’s very rare that we would do that,” said Roberts.
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In the Miami case, the panel did send a letter back to the involved parties seeking more clarification. Roberts said the COI is supposed to defer to the parties’ agreement and cited a recommendation from the Division I Transformation Committee that suggested that contested hearings only be used for the most severe infractions cases.
Still, the COI did not want to tell the rest of Division I that boosters can roam freely and do whatever they like, so the group is trying to signal its willingness to penalize NIL rule-breaking by disassociating boosters — even though this case came up short of that outcome.
“We wanted to make sure that this decision didn’t say, ‘We’ve got a big exception here. Collectives can go ahead and do this stuff,’” Roberts said. “We’re not telling you we’re going to slam (someone), but don’t take this as precedent that it will never happen.”
A negotiated resolution cannot actually form a precedent, but administrators on campuses throughout the country will use this decision to inform behavior. Will it deter bad actors? Without a severe penalty for those involved in this case, such a behavioral change seems unlikely.
That’s why the COI is emphasizing the future. The “NIL presumption” bylaw would represent a significant shift in the process that could lead to the NCAA enforcement staff picking up more cases and getting the information it needs.
“It’s a very interesting change,” Roberts said. “Conduct that was in theory an inducement was the enforcement’s burden. And now it’s going to be the burden of, in essence, the defendant — to say, ‘Hey, I didn’t do it.’”
Couple the new NIL presumption with updated NIL guidance adopted by the D-I Board of Directors last year that outlines what is and isn’t permissible for schools and/or boosters, particularly regarding prospective athletes, and the parallel tracks should complement each other. The new standards should finally give schools what their own leaders have been clamoring for over the past 18 months: rules and their subsequent enforcement. In theory, at least.
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“What this NIL thing has done is introduce a completely different sphere of potential conduct that we’re concerned about,” Miller said. “Since this (Miami) case came out before that presumption, we just want to make sure that the membership and the athletic departments and boosters know that there is concern and will continue to be a concern about booster conduct in the NIL space.
“That’s something new under the sun.”
It didn’t seem right, Miller said, to go scorched-earth on Miami or Ruiz based on the documented impermissible contact between Meier and Ruiz, and the Cavinder twins’ dinner at Ruiz’s home prior to their official visit. Under a new standard, perhaps the resolution looks different than it did on Friday afternoon. Maybe it ends up in the same place.
If nothing else, it’s clear that, for the NCAA’s purposes, the next shoe to drop will need to be a big one. Otherwise, collectives will collectively shrug their shoulders and continue pushing boundaries. Boosters will decide the rewards of reaching out to recruits or transfers before they’re enrolled outweigh the risks. Chaos will continue to rule the unregulated space.
Or perhaps Friday’s stop sign will eventually lead to a seminal infractions case that punishes bad actors and deters bad behavior — someday, somehow. And it won’t need a special header to make its point.
(Photo: Stacy Revere / Getty Images)
