Memphis men's basketball coach Penny Hardaway will not coach the team's first three games of the 2023-24 season, according to an NCAA release announcing the punishment on Wednesday.
"Men's basketball coaches committed recruiting violations when they participated in two impermissible in-home recruiting visits with a prospect during his junior year of high school," the Division I Committee on Infractions announced. "Because of his personal involvement in the violations and failure to monitor his staff, the men's basketball head coach also violated head coach responsibility rules."
The NCAA Committee on Infractions (COI) deemed the penalties, which occurred during the 2021-22 season, to be Level II in nature. The school will pay a $5,000 fine and serve a one-year probationary period extended onto its current probation (which stems from the James Wiseman IARP case) but will not face additional sanctions. This infraction was discovered amid the Wiseman probe but was not related to the transgressions in that case.
"The head coach bears ultimate responsibility for what occurred in his program," the COI's decision states. "He could have taken steps to prevent the violations from occurring but did not." (Read the COI report here.)
Memphis met with the NCAA and agreed to the penalties in December.
"We supported Coach Hardaway's right to work directly with the NCAA on his portion of the case, and we strongly believe Coach Hardaway never intentionally committed a violation," read a Memphis statement. "The University of Memphis is committed to compliance. We will learn from this incident and be even more diligent in our education and monitoring. Now that the entirety of this case is finalized, we will move forward in support of Coach Hardaway and our men's basketball program, as we do all our programs."
From the NCAA's release:
The violations in this case centered around the recruitment of one highly rated men's basketball prospect. First, in September of the prospect's junior year of high school, a Memphis men's basketball assistant coach traveled to his home in another state and visited with him and his family. Two weeks later, the Memphis men's basketball head coach did the same. NCAA rules, as adopted by members, require any in-person contacts with recruits during the fall months of their junior year of high school to be made at the prospects' schools, not in their homes. As a result, these visits violated recruiting rules.
The Tigers are coming off a 26-9 season and a second straight NCAA Tournament appearance. Hardaway's team is not projected to be ranked heading into the season but figures to again be a contender in the American Athletic Conference. Next season will be Hardaway's sixth as the coach of his alma mater.
