The Michigan football team and coach Rich Rodriguez committed major violations of NCAA rules governing practice hours and limits on the number of coaches, but the breaches were not nearly as serious as alleged in early, largely unattributed media reports and they caused no substantial harm to student athletes, the NCAA said Thursday.
The Committee on Infractions publicly reprimanded and censured Michigan and the team and increased the two-year probation period the university imposed on the football program, to three years, through Nov. 3, 2013. As the university had already done, it reduced the number of practice hours by 130 through the conclusion of the 2011-12 academic year.
On campus, athletic director David Brandon, U-M President Mary Sue Coleman and Rodriguez said they were satisfied with the report and penalties. The university had admitted it made mistakes and has said it has already fixed them, including cutting 32 hours of practice from the football team already.
"I'm really pleased with the conclusion," Brandon said.
In addition the probation, the NCAA will require Rodriguez to attend the 2011 NCAA Regional Rules Seminar. The committee found that Rodriguez had failed "to monitor" the football program. But it cleared Rodriguez of a grave accusation: that he failed to foster an atmosphere of compliance with NCAA rules. Brandon said the findings will not lead to Rodriguez's termination, as is allowed under his contract.
The athletic director said earlier this year that the allegations were not enough to fire Rodriguez and he said the report released today shows the committee had agreed there was not a failure to foster an atmosphere of compliance.
"The committee on infractions listened to that and changed their position," he said.
Coleman, who labeled the charges against the university regarding the basketball program a "great shame," was supportive of Brandon, Rodriguez and its work with the NCAA. The findings, though major, don't compare to the "corruption of young people" like that with the basketball program.
"I do not put this in the same category," she said.
"When the snows fall and the white winds blow, the lone wolf dies but the pack survives." Winter is Coming Now this is the Law of the Jungle—as old and as true as the sky; And the wolf that shall keep it may prosper, but the wolf that shall break it must die. As the creeper that girdles the tree-trunk, the Law runneth forward and back; For the strength of the Pack is the Wolf, and the strength of the Wolf is the Pack.
