NCAA Proposal Passed - Hiring "Associates" of Basketball Recruits

[towerview road]

At the big NCAA annual convention in Atlanta this week, an interesting proposal passed:

"A proposal barring men’s basketball programs for employing individuals “associated with [a] prospective student-athlete” two years before and after the athlete in question is enrolled at college was passed. This measure is meant to counter the hiring of high school coaches and those of other travel basketball squads in order to entice recruits to attend certain colleges." (from Inside Higher Ed)

This sounds great to me. Hopefully will curb all of the 'agents'/AAU guys who scam the system it seems.

Do you think it will have a big impact?

Surprised no one else is really covering this yet.

Also passed (all reported by IHE):

* A proposal to allow prospective athletes to play on professional teams as long as they are not paid was approved. Skiing, however, was added alongside men’s hockey to a list of sports to which this rule does not apply. Currently, prospective athletes who are not compensated themselves but still play alongside professionals lose their eligibility and cannot play in the NCAA.
* A proposal to further define the types of online courses that can be used by high school athletes to fulfill NCAA initial eligibility requirements was passed. Students and instructors in these courses, according to the change, must “have regular interaction with one another for purposes of teaching, evaluating and providing assistance to the student throughout the duration of the course.” NCAA officials noted this proposal was influenced by the increasing number of high school students taking online courses.
* A proposal limiting the number of credit hours of physical education to two that community college men’s basketball players may use to fulfill NCAA transfer eligibility requirements was approved.
* A proposal stipulating that institutions may host sports camps or clinics for prospective athletes only within a 100-mile radius of their campuses was approved. This measure is meant to curb the practice of holding such camps far from campus for the purpose of recruiting certain athletes. Football was excluded from this proposal because a rule already exists prohibiting this practice.

[1999ballboy]

Good idea in principle, but the word "associated" is a little too open for interpretation. If a coach worked at a basketball camp that a player attended but had little contact with him, does that count? This could end up preventing hirings that are purely coincidental if they probe too far into players' pasts

Also, does "two years before and after" refer to the timeframe in which the person is not allowed to be employed, or the timeframe during which said person must be associated with the athlete to be barred from employment at any time?

[towerview road]

1999, I interpreted it as 2 years before and after the student is enrolled (let's say John Doe is the #1 HS recruit and his coach is Bob Smith, UK couldn't hire Bob Smith a year after John Doe matrics/goes to the NBA -- to prevent promises of future employment dependent on the athlete's enrollment I guess).

I could be wrong though.

[Olympic Fan]

It will be interesting to see how this applies. When I look back at ACC history, it seems like this would prevent:

-- Terry Holland from hiring Mike Schuler (sp?) -- he was the high school coach for Jeff Lamp and Lee Raker. Raker was thought to be a throw-in (although he became a solid ACC player), but Lamp was viewed as a key recruiting target for UVa (and indeed became an All-ACC performer).

-- Larry Brown from hiring at Ed Manning at Kansas (I know that this is not strictly ACC, but Danny was a key ACC target). Ed, a former ABA player, was driving a truck when Larry offered him a coaching job -- in the summer before his son's senior year of HS ... Danny happened to be the nation's top recruiting target at that moment.

-- Herb Sendek hired the HS coach at Atlantic Shores Academy, Mark Phelps, the year he signed Kenny Inge ... a year after Damon Thornton came to State. Also, Sean Miller was on the Pack staff when they got his younger brother Archie Miller ... would that have been allowed?

-- One of the reasons that Gus Gilchrist bounced from Virginia Tech to Maryland to South Florida (is that where he ended up?) is because he had a personal trainer that he wanted hired as a staffer. Greenberg and Gary refused, but the guy was hired at the school where Gilchrist ended up.

-- It's happened at Duke: K hired DeMatha assistant Mike Brey within a year of landing Danny Ferry, the DeMatha star who was the best prospect in the country in the spring of 1985. Now, I believe that the hiring had nothing to do with getting Ferry -- but K met and got to know Brey during his recruitment of Ferry and ended up adding him because he respected his ability. Still, it sounds like that under the new rule, this hire would not have been allowed.

I'm sure there are plenty of more instances. These are just the ones that jump out at me.