NCAA Accuses Texas A&M-Corpus Christi of Nine Violations; Eight Are Major

The NCAA has formally accused Texas A&M-Corpus Christi of nine violations -- including eight major. The violations range in sports (men's tennis, women's volleyball) including men's basketball. They've even said the dreaded statement of "lack of institutional control".

The NCAA's notice of allegations, obtained Saturday by The Associated Press, also accuses athletic director Brian Teter of not reporting to the NCAA his knowledge of two ineligible players and later submitting a false self-report regarding one of those players. Teter failed to conduct himself in accordance with the association's "high standards of honesty and sportsmanship," the notice said.

The NCAA charged the athletic department with a lack of institutional control, saying the school failed to monitor the eligibility of student-athletes, properly train staff in NCAA rules, police itself for rules violations and accurately report any violations.

The men's basketball program has been accused that an assistant coach made 43 inpermissable phone calls to four recruits, head coach Perry Clark using personal money to fund recruiting trips, and providing transportation for a recruit to renew his immigration papers.

The Islanders' program has been only around 10 years and received some national attention when they put a scare into Wisconsin in the first round of the NCAA Tournament a couple of years ago.

A long time buddy of mine and writer for Hoopsworld, Yannis Koutroupis is a student at TAMU-CC and a co-host on ESPN Radio in Corpus Christi. I asked for his reaction to the allegations:

At this time last year Texas A&M Corpus Christi was an up and coming mid-major with a bright future ahead of them. Now they appear headed back to square one due to the violations and the negligence they've had regarding these serious issues. If they did indeed not only fail to report these violations in a timely manner but try to mislead the NCAA, the university is in big trouble.