Welp.
The NCAA has released its final ruling on its investigation into the Louisville basketball program, and the results appear to be as bad as we all feared. Maybe. Probably.
The NCAA had like 18 months to get this ready and they still couldn’t give us clarity with its final ruling.
Here’s what we know for certain:
—Rick Pitino has been suspended for the first five ACC games of the 2017-18 season.
—Andre McGee has been given a 10-year show-cause order that will keep him out of college basketball (officially) for at least a decade.
—Louisville will be on probation from June 15, 2017, through June 14, 2021.
—A reduction of four total scholarships over the four-year probation period.
—The NCAA accepted the program’s postseason ban for 2016 and will not be issuing any further postseason bans.
When we get to the issue of the 2013 national championship banner is when things get murky.
Here’s the NCAA’s official statement on the matter.
A vacation of basketball records in which student-athletes competed while ineligible from December 2010 and July 2014. The university will provide a written report containing the games impacted to the NCAA media coordination and statistics staff within 45 days of the public decision release.
Basically (I think), Louisville has 45 days to determine which games from 2010-2014 were played with players who were ineligible. They will then report those games, and all those games will be vacated.
To me, that reads like the NCAA wants the banner to come down, but they don’t want to be the ones who do it. I suppose we’ll find out more in the hours to come.
Next up, the powers that be with the NCAA will be holding a teleconference at noon. U of L interim president Greg Postel, Tom Jurich and Rick Pitino have scheduled a press conference for 12:30.
You can read the NCAA’s complete ruling here.
