As the texts trickled in Friday afternoon from disillusioned men’s college basketball coaches and administrators after another botched NCAA infractions ruling, this one stood out: “Whoever the lawyers were that handled the case for Auburn and Bruce [Pearl] are the ones that actually have the playbook the Southern District [of New York] were talking about it 2017.”
Bingo. The lawyers kicked the NCAA’s ineffectual a--. Again.
The SDNY’s famous “We’ve got your playbook” statement became a hollow boast at the federal criminal level, and thus far it is equally empty in the college justice system. The first of the six major infractions cases to come out of the FBI investigation of corruption in college hoops has now ended with a whimper of a penalty from the NCAA.