Federal documents have revealed alleged corruption across the college basketball landscape. Evidence collected by the FBI in an ongoing years-long investigation could result in NCAA sanctions for some of the biggest programs in college basketball.
The documents allegedly reveal an underground recruiting operation for at least 20 Division I school programs and as many as 25 players. They include expense reports that list payments made to college athletes and their families for entertainment and travel expenses
The documents include balance sheets and expense reports for the agency ASM Sports for schools such as Duke, North Carolina, Texas, Kentucky, Michigan State, LSU, Maryland, USC, and Alabama, among others.
Balance sheets from ASM Sports show payments of up to $43,500 to former N.C State guard Dennis Smith Jr., who was a first-round pick for the Dallas Mavericks last year.
Other names include Seton Hall’s freshman Isaiah Whitehead who received $26,136 and last year’s number-one pick, Markelle Fultz, receiving $10,000, even though he did not end up signing with ASM Sports.
Current big college stars included in the investigation are Miles Bridges (Michigan State), Collin Sexton (Alabama) and Wendell Carter (Duke).
The FBI has already charged several college coaches in conjunction with the corruption team.
If the reported allegations prove true it could have a huge impact on prestigious programs, and coaches such as Mike Krzyzewski (Duke), Tom Izzo (Michigan State), John Calipari (Kentucky) and Roy Williams (North Carolina) could end up taking the fall.
According to a statement released early today by NCAA president Mark Emmert, the allegations “if true, point to systematic failures that must be fixed and fixed now if we want college sports in America.”
For now, there has been no announcement on how the NCAA enforcement office would handle the cases and what sanctions would be imposed on the schools involved and their staffs.
