University of Miami forward Dewan Hernandez lost his appeal and was declared ineligible for the season by the NCAA, just hours before the Hurricanes’ conference opener against 18th-ranked North Carolina State.
Hernandez, a junior and the team’s leading big man last season, sat out the first 12 games of the season while the university and the NCAA reviewed his eligibility. His name surfaced in court documents related to the FBI investigation of shoe companies’ influence on college basketball. One of the defendants in the case, an agent runner named Christian Dawkins, mentioned Hernandez’s name in an e-mail in which he detailed plans to pay prospective pro players.