National Collegiate Athletic Association

The NCAA News - News Features

December 23, 1996

Eligibility Committee to reconsider proposals

Two pieces of legislation failed to gain support from Council

De minimus and season-of-competition waiver proposals that were not supported by the NCAA Council for the 1997 NCAA Convention will be reviewed at the June 1997 NCAA Eligibility Committee meeting and resubmitted for action through the appropriate governance processes.

The Eligibility Committee, meeting December 2-3 in Kansas City, Missouri, determined that it would re-examine both proposals at the committee's June meeting in preparation for resubmitting them next August.

The committee had requested that the Council sponsor a proposal at the 1997 Convention to amend legislation to permit a student-athlete to regain a season of competition when a coaching staff member costs the student-athlete a season by putting him or her into a contest while unsure of the student-athlete's eligibility status, and the student subsequently is determined to be ineligible for competition.

Such a situation usually involves a coaching staff member who makes an improper decision to permit a student-athlete to participate in one or two contests at the beginning of a season, when the staff member is unsure of the student's eligibility status. The involved student suffers a harsh penalty, even though it was the coach's decision to permit the student to participate, the committee said.

The legislation would not provide relief to the student-athlete who knows he or she is ineligible and should not be participating. The committee would require the student-athlete to be withheld the next season from the one or two contests in which he or she participated while ineligible, and forfeiture of contests would be required.

The committee also had asked for Council sponsorship of a proposal to amend Bylaws 13 and 16 to eliminate the ineligibility component when a prospect or a student-athlete receives a small, inconsequential (de minimus) benefit that results in a violation of NCAA rules.

The proposal would have required the student to repay the benefit, and the involvement by the student had to be innocent or inadvertent.

The committee plans to review the proposals and determine how they should be submitted for next year through the new governance process.

The committee also added impermissible involvement with financial advisors to the list of types of eligibility cases in which a higher condition for restoration of eligibility should occur.

Already on the list were gambling, academic fraud, involvement with agents, conscious or knowing wrongdoing, and selling of complimentary tickets.

While it is currently permissible for student-athletes to use the services of a financial advisor, the effect of this decision will be to permit the eligibility appeals staff to impose significant conditions for restoration of eligibility on student-athletes who accept impermissible benefits from a financial advisor.

OTHER HIGHLIGHTS

Eligibility Committee
December 2-3/Kansas City, Missouri

  • Discussed shoe company representatives who provide impermissible benefits to student-athletes and determined that a more in-depth review would be needed at the committee's June meeting.

  • Heard a presentation on gambling by two FBI agents. With gambling becoming a major issue, the committee had asked the FBI to provide information on gambling and gambling behaviors to assist committee members in their deliberations in cases involving gambling. Committee members wanted additional expertise to assist them when asking questions of student-athletes at hearings and in considering facts surrounding a case.

  • Met with William S. Saum, NCAA representative for gambling and agent issues, to discuss whether the level of cooperation from the student-athlete in an eligibility case involving gambling should be taken into consideration in assessing penalties.

  • Discussed use of the term "ineligible" and the public perception of the term. NCAA staff members from public affairs and eligibility will study use of the term and develop suggestions for the committee to consider at its June meeting.