Living in Ohio in just the last couple months has led to much in the way of thoughts on NCAA compliance. So, it partially amused me to note that the Pitt Athletic site has a section on “Compliance.” Most of it appears to still be under construction, i.e., no content.
Of course, when talking of compliance and NCAA violations, there is no one that knows it better than the man that leaves a trail of slime wherever he goes, a man who causes other attorneys (like myself) to say about him, “sure he went to law school, but he’s not really a lawyer. He’s not one of us.” I’m speaking of course of Rick Neuheisel.
Neuheisel is now suing his last employer, the University of Washington, and the NCAA over his termination for cause. This comes, just as Washington released a series of tapes, pursuant to public disclosure laws via requests from The Seattle Times and the Seattle Post-Intelligencer.
The tapes tend to show Neuheisel lying to direct questions.
Former Washington football coach Rick Neuheisel told NCAA investigators he never gambled, then later acknowledged his involvement in neighborhood NCAA basketball pools.
Audio tapes released Thursday showed Neuheisel lied when initially questioned by the NCAA about gambling. The organization considers gambling a major rules violation.
The tapes support handwritten notes, released last month, from the meeting. Neuheisel was fired July 28 as Washington’s coach for participating in the pools and for not being forthcoming with NCAA investigators.
“I never placed a bet on anything,” Neuheisel said early in the tapes, recorded June 4 when NCAA investigators first met with him.
A short time later, he was asked whether he had any concerns about going to the event in 2002 and 2003. Teams of neighbors pooled money and bid on NCAA Tournament teams in an auction-style setting.
“I won’t go again, if that’s the question,” Neuheisel said, laughing. “No, I didn’t have any concerns at all. I know we can’t gamble. I know I can’t place a bet or anything like that, but I wasn’t. I was just there watching.”
He kept changing his story the deeper it got. His lawyer is arguing in the lawsuit, much the way Neuheisel did when he was publicly fighting to keep his job (actually, he was just trying to get a buyout rather than dismissal for cause). That he never really violated any rules, and if he did it was based on mistaken advice given by the University of Washington’s compliance officer.
It’s consistent with Neuheisel’s violations of recruiting and ethics at Colorado and Washington. Skate up to the razor’s edge of the line, and maybe fall over it just a little, but not so much that it can’t be argued that there was a gray area — thus precluding major penalties, only continual paper cut, minor ones.
I’ve always thought that was in part because of Neuheisel taking the wrong lessons from law school (the majority of it is because Neuheisel is a slimy, corrupt, and doesn’t think the rules apply to him kind of guy) — the line can be blurry and as long as you don’t go over a clear line, you can wriggle free.
