Gary Parrish

Former Indiana coach Kelvin Sampson just released a statement about today's NCAA ruling.

The statement, obtained by CBSSports.com, reads: “I’m deeply disappointed in today’s findings by the NCAA, but the accusations at hand are things that happened on my watch and therefore I will take responsibility. I am truly sorry that there were so many people who were hurt in this situation. For the sake of everyone involved, including my family, it is time to move on.”

Good for Indiana.

But actually, I'd like to say good for the NCAA.

Because the governing body has decided to do the right thing and not further penalize the Hoosiers basketball program, according to the Indianapolis Star. The school will hold a press conference at 4 p.m. ET, at which time the case is expected to be announced and discussed and (presumably) applauded.

Look, I'm not into letting cheaters walk.

Cheaters should pay.

But Indiana has already (and is still) paying dearly, and if you don't believe me I'd advise you to check the box score from Monday's 88-50 loss to Notre Dame. The Hoosiers were scrappy and tough and yet totally dominated, which was to be expected because that's what happens when you lose every relevant player and recruit in any particular year. And that's why I suggested five months ago that the NCAA should do exactly what it did, i.e., recognize that Indiana is suffering to an unusual degree and in turn decline to kick a Hoosier while it's down.

Ultimately, that's what happened.

So good for Indiana.

And, more to the point, good for the NCAA.

As for Kelvin Sampson and the five-year show-cause penalty the NCAA has reportedly levied against him, I think it's mostly inconsequential. Sampson was never going to get a college job in the next five years anyway, and I'm not sure any school will ever hire him again given that he found such high-profile trouble at two different schools. So in reality, the show-cause is probably unnecessary, and the guess here is that Sampson -- now an assistant with the Milwaukee Bucks -- will just continue learning the NBA game and probably find himself as a head coach in that league someday, which is proof that we live in a country like no other.

Former coach Kelvin Sampson has released a statement in response to Indiana's accusations that he withheld information and concealed impermissible phone calls from the school's compliance department.

The statement was sent to CBSSports.com by Sampson's representation.

It reads as follows:

“In no way did I ever hide or withhold information from Indiana University’s compliance department. I vehemently deny the inference that I made and concealed impermissible calls. The NCAA has never alleged that I initiated any illegal phone calls to recruits while serving as the head coach at Indiana. I always provided Indiana with everything they requested, including all documents and phone records."

Here's Thursday's Dear Gary ...

Dear Gary: I understand that when you only return one scholarship player you have a lot of places to stick anyone who wants to play for your program. The puzzling thing about Indiana's success in recruiting is that I guess the (prospects) do not expect any major (or even minor) consequences from all of Kelvin Sampson's handy work. Is IU getting away with a slap on the wrist, or were the violations just not that serious?

-- Brent

The violations were serious, yes.

But I wouldn't expect much more in the way of serious/program-altering penalties.

I mean, think about it. The coach who committed the NCAA violations (Kelvin Sampson) is gone and the athletic director who hired the coach (Rick Greenspan) has already announced his resignation. Meanwhile, pretty much  the entire roster Sampson assembled is also gone, meaning any serious additional punishments levied against IU would only hurt an athletic director, coach and team that had nothing to do with anything that went down.

For that reason, I think the NCAA will show sympathy to some degree.

My prediction: There won't be any penalties that will seriously affect the class Tom Crean is currently compiling because these players won't enroll until the 2009-10 school year. In other words, even something as damaging as a one-year NCAA tournament ban would be over before Christian Watford, Maurice Creek and the rest of the Class of 2009 commitments are on campus, which is why I think they're correct to assume the worst will be behind IU by the time it matters to them.

Here's Friday's Dear Gary ...

Dear Gary: What do you think will happen to Indiana basketball in the hearing (with the NCAA) in Seattle?

-- Jeff

My guess is that a postseason ban or anything like that isn't coming, and that Indiana has seen the worst of what it's going to see. Sure, the school hired Kelvin Sampson after he had already been caught breaking NCAA rules at Oklahoma, and it's fair to argue it should've known better. But IU fired him in the middle of the season and basically ruined a Top 10 team in the process, and with everything that's happened since then -- IU is now down to just one returning scholarship player -- I'd be all for the NCAA recognizing this program has already taken a significant penalty for its mistakes, all for the NCAA allowing Tom Crean to start fresh in his attempt restore the brand of Indiana basketball while letting the Sampson era remain in the past (beyond the self-imposed penalties Indiana has already levied).

That's what I think will happen today in Seattle. Either way, Mark Alesia has sort of a quick-reference guide to what's happening and what it all means in today's Indianapolis Star. It's worth checking out, if you want.

Jordan Crawford is leaving Indiana.

School officials confirmed Wednesday that the rising sophomore has decided to transfer and leave new coach Tom Crean with just one scholarship player who is set to return for the 2008-09 season. Put another way, the Indiana team that won 25 games last season will be without its top 10 scorers, meaning the recovery from the scandal-ridden Kelvin Sampson era will likely be more difficult than anybody could've ever expected.

The lone IU veteran will be Kyle Taber.

He averaged 1.3 points per game last season.

Crawford averaged 9.7 points per game last season.

Indiana released its response to the NCAA this afternoon. It's a document that suggests the school has been punished enough and does not deserve additional sanctions. It also states that it's "reasonable to conclude" former coach Kelvin Sampson repeatedly misled NCAA investigators.

Sampson has formally addressed the NCAA with a written response, too.

The following text is his cover letter, obtained by CBSSports.com.

May 8, 2008

VIA OVERNIGHT DELIVERY

NCAA Division I Committee on Infractions
1802 Alonzo Watford Sr. Drive
Indianapolis, IN  46202

 Dear Committee Members:

Enclosed is my written Response to the allegations set forth in the NCAA enforcement staff’s Notice of Allegations to Indiana University, Bloomington, dated February 8, 2008.  I have been assisted in the preparation of this Response by legal counsel to ensure that I proceed as expected by your policies, procedures and practices.

When I appeared before you in April 2006 to address recruiting telephone contact violations at the University of Oklahoma, I accepted responsibility for my mistakes, I answered your questions truthfully and with great candor, and I pledged to do everything within my power to avoid violations in the future.  That experience had a profound effect on me.  I was embarrassed and I was wholly determined to not put myself and my family through another experience like that.

When I arrived at Indiana University, I hired an experienced staff and made my expectation of strict compliance with NCAA rules and with the restrictions imposed upon our staff very clear.  As set forth in detail in the body of my Response, each member of my staff confirms that my expectations were made clear.  I endorsed and cooperated fully with the monitoring systems set in place by Indiana’s athletics compliance staff.  I relied upon the monitoring program that was set in place.  Again, the statements of my staff as set forth in my Response confirm this.  I told my staff repeatedly that I never again wanted to go through an experience like I had in the Oklahoma case and that we as a staff needed to completely buy into the monitoring systems implemented by Indiana’s compliance program. 

On the day the recruiting restrictions ended in May 2007, I felt a sense of great relief and peace.  I believed that the darkest days of my coaching career were behind me and that we could now move forward with our goal of returning Indiana’s basketball program to a position of prominence.  I went to Athletic Director Rick Greenspan’s office and together, we celebrated the occasion with “high fives.”  With the recruiting call monitoring system we believed was being operated by the compliance staff, neither of us had any reason to think there might be issues.

Accordingly, I cannot adequately describe in words how stunned I was to learn from Mr. Greenspan later that summer that the compliance office’s review of my staff’s phone records had revealed possible violations.  First, I could not believe that if in fact the records showed violations, some since my staff’s earliest days at the University, the matters had not been detected and brought to the attention of Mr. Greenspan and myself much earlier so they could have been addressed in a timely fashion.  And second, given how strongly and frequently I had communicated to my staff that I expected 100 percent compliance – I could not believe that NCAA rules and Committee on Infractions’ imposed restrictions had apparently been disregarded. 

My life since that day has been a nightmare and my family has suffered profoundly along with me.  I have been judged by many in the media and public to be a cheat and a liar and I have lost my job – all long before I will have had an opportunity to present my case to you and without Indiana University conducting a meaningful investigation into the allegations made by the enforcement staff.  Even this NCAA process has not followed the prescribed course.  A date for the hearing of this case was set before interviews, including one of me, were completed by the enforcement staff and before the enforcement staff issued its Notice of Allegations.  These pre-determined results are of grave concern to me.  It is my hope that the scheduled June hearing will allay my fears that final judgments have already been made.

As difficult as this process and experience has been for me, I do, given the circumstances, look forward to the opportunity to appear before you and, with the assistance of my counsel, to attempt to ensure that you have all of the information available on the relevant matters so that you can make a fair, unbiased and accurate determination on whether I knowingly participated in telephone conversations with recruits that were contrary to the restrictions imposed upon me and Indiana University by your committee following the Oklahoma infractions case.

Sincerely,

Kelvin Sampson

Everybody knew the Kelvin Sampson situation took its toll on the court at Indiana.

You could see it in the record.

But it also devastated the Hoosiers in the classroom.

"There were just so many problems and so many issues," new Indiana coach Tom Crean told me Thursday by phone. "From the looks of it, people took a lot of liberties with not being in class and not doing the work they needed to do (in the second semester)."

Crean said the basketball team had a combined 2.9 GPA in the first semester and that seven players had a 3.0 or better. In other words, the academic problems that have forced Crean to completely alter IU's roster didn't surface until the second semester, which coincided with Sampson's departure becoming more and more apparent.

"I don't think I had any idea how far it had drifted academically," Crean said. "I don't think anybody did."

Kelvin Sampson resigned to avoid termination.

I'm glad he did it before dinner.

Because I'm hungry.

So I'm going to eat and I'll check back in later.

The official announcement should come Friday, at which time Indiana administrators will explain how and why they suspended or fired -- but either way removed -- Kelvin Sampson as their men's basketball coach. I reported earlier that athletic director Rick Greenspan told five players at a Thursday meeting that Sampson will not coach the Hoosiers at Northwestern on Saturday, and so the question of whether IU will be making a coaching switch has been answered barring any legal problems or other developments (like a player revolt, as it turns out) that could move Greenspan off his position in the next 24 hours

Short of that, Sampson will be gone.

Dan Dakich is expected to take over on an interim basis.

And then it'll be interesting to see how the rest of this season unfolds, whether the Hoosiers can win a Big Ten title and advance to the Final Four despite their 22-4 record being overshadowed by off-the-court controversy. It's not unprecedented, you know? Look no further than Michigan's improbable run to the 1989 NCAA Tournament title under then-interim-coach Steve Fisher as proof. But unless Dakich does something similarly spectacular it's difficult to imagine him landing the job on a fulltime basis if only because IU was burned last time it hired an interim (when Mike Davis got the job on a permanent basis after leading the Hoosiers to the 2001 national title game) and administrations tend to shy away from making the same moves that previously led to bad results.

In other words, it's reasonable to expect a national coaching search.

But it's unreasonable to expect Bob Knight to be a factor.

Lets clear that up now.

Knight was great in his time, no question. But he has little interest in recruiting and elite prospects have even less interest in playing for him. Thus, hiring Knight would be a mistake because you can't win in the Big Ten without players -- especially when Ohio State's Thad Matta, Purdue's Matt Painter, Michigan State's Tom Izzo and Wisconsin's Bo Ryan are always going to have players -- and Knight doesn't seem capable of luring great players.

So who will Indiana hire?

Some of the names that have already surfaced (and make sense) are Washington State's Tony Bennett, Virginia Commonwealth's Anthony Grant, Vanderbilt's Kevin Stallings, Tennessee's Bruce Pearl, New Mexico's Steve Alford, Xavier's Sean Miller and former Chicago Bulls' coach Scott Skiles. I'm confident any of those men would take the job, except perhaps Pearl. And so the sooner Indiana can land one of them the better, and then the Hoosiers can finally get to work on putting this saga behind them.

The NCAA thinks Kelvin Sampson broke rules and lied when asked for an explanation.

Funny, that's the same thing I thought ... four months ago.

Here's my blog entry from last Oct. 16, the day after it was revealed Sampson acknowledged being on three-way calls with prospects and an assistant but denied he understood he was on three-way calls with prospects and an assistant.
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CINCINNATI -- On a Monday drive from Lexington to Cincinnati I spent time talking to multiple basketball coaches. Naturally, Kelvin Sampson was a subject of conversation, and all I can tell you is that -- take this for what it's worth -- I couldn't find a single person in the business who believes it's possible that Sampson could've been on those three-way calls (that are OK by NCAA standards but weren't OK under Sampson's sanctions) with an assistant and recruit without knowing.

Of course, this is what Sampson claimed Sunday.

His phone would ring. He would answer it. A recruit would start talking. His assistant (Rob Senderoff) would stay quiet. And Sampson would just think that the recruit had called him on his own accord, which would've been perfectly legal. But here's the problem with that explanation: Unless Sampson's phone works differently from the way every other phone of every other coach I spoke with works -- and my own phone, it's worth noting -- then when Senderoff called Sampson to initiate the three-way call it would've been Senderoff's phone number that showed up on Sampson's caller ID. So if this was all innocent, wouldn't Sampson have been shocked to hear a recruit's voice after seeing Senderoff's phone number in the caller ID? Wouldn't the first question have been, "Hey recruit. Why are you calling me from Rob's phone?"

"That's why his story isn't believable," said one high-major assistant. "We use three-way calls all the time, and what he's describing just isn't the way it works. The way it works is for me to get a recruit on the phone and then patch Coach in, and when Coach answers I say, 'Hey Coach. I've got so-and-so on the line here for you.' That's why it's hard to believe this is all innocent."

To be clear, all the facts aren't out yet. There could be more we don't know, like that Sampson's caller ID was broken or that Senderoff had a call block on his phone that wouldn't show Sampson who was on the other end of line. But barring such unusual circumstances, the explanation doesn't ring true, and that's why Sampson is taking a beating in the business both publicly from the media and privately from his colleagues.
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So am I surprised by Wednesday's news?

In a word, no.

As the above blog shows I never believed Sampson was believable.

And the crazy thing is that though the phone calls would not have cost him his job the subsequent lies just might.