Secondary recruiting violation self-reported

In an ironic instance of history repeating itself, a recruiting violation involving phone calls once again forced the men’s basketball program to punish itself last December.

IU’s compliance department discovered the secondary recruiting violation on Nov. 21 and self-reported the instance to the NCAA and Big Ten on Dec. 10. The coaching staff’s “mistake” was revealed during a routine check of compliance office’s phone call monitoring system.

The violation stemmed from a week in October when the Hoosier coaching staff made one too many phone calls to IU recruit Bawa Muniru. Schools are allotted two phone calls to senior prospects per week. IU committed the violation by placing three.

The men’s basketball and compliance programs have a system set up where IU coach Tom Crean and a designated assistant coach each contract a recruit once per
week.

The violation occurred last October when assistant coach Roshown McLeod left the Class of 2009 recruit a voicemail, unaware Crean had contacted Muniru twice earlier in the week, instead of his typical one phone call.

In response to the violation, IU took corrective action and prohibited the men’s basketball program from making recruiting phone calls for a week in December.

An IU Athletics spokesperson estimated the department as a whole commits 20 to 25 secondary violations a year.

Despite the latest recruiting mishap, IU Athletics reiterated its dedication to compliance in a statement Wednesday.

“Coach Crean places a tremendous amount of emphasis on the proper use of phone calls in his staff’s recruiting efforts and phone use procedures are discussed regularly with the compliance office staff,” the department said.

Recruiting phone calls placed by the IU coaching staff are documented daily and reported to the IU compliance staff, according to the statement.

The latest recruiting violation is an all-too-soon reminder of the previous coaching staff’s recruiting discretions, led by former IU coaches Kelvin Sampson and Rob Senderoff.

On Nov. 25, four days after Crean and his staff reported their secondary violation, the NCAA Committee of Infractions released its final report in regards to the program’s five alleged “major” recruiting violations.

The NCAA decided not to punish the school any further and accepted the University’s self-imposed three-year probationary period.

The Indianapolis Star first reported the violation Monday through a public records request.