Yahoo Finance Houston to vacate three wins from 2018 after tutor did player's course work
The University of Houston must vacate three wins from the 2018 season after the NCAA said Wednesday that a former tutor at the school did classwork for a football player.
According to the NCAA’s release, “The former tutor wrote four papers for two football student-athletes in exchange for money over a month and a half. As a result of the academic misconduct, one of the student-athletes competed while ineligible.”
In addition, the NCAA’s committee on infractions said it noted “that the former tutor acted out of self-interest and violated Houston’s academic misconduct policy. He failed to cooperate with the NCAA infractions process by refusing to participate in an interview with enforcement staff or take part in the summary disposition process.”
The three wins that Houston must vacate aren’t identified and are officially listed as a self-imposed penalty. The NCAA said that Houston must give it a written report detailing the vacated games within two weeks. The tutor was also given an eight-year show-cause penalty.
Houston went 8-5 in 2018 and will be officially listed as 5-5 after the wins are vacated. The school fired coach Major Applewhite after a season-ending bowl blowout to Army and hired former West Virginia coach Dana Holgorsen as his replacement.
The Houston decision comes weeks after the NCAA upheld its decision to ban Missouri from the postseason in football, baseball and softball because of a similar issue. The Tigers got postseason bans because a tutor did assignments for 12 athletes across the three sports. Missouri cooperated with the NCAA’s enforcement in the case.
In Houston’s case, the teams that were on the other side of the vacated wins do not get to retroactively claim victories.
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Ex-volleyball coach gets penalties
The NCAA also said that former women’s volleyball head coach Kaddie Platt received a two-year show-cause penalty. Platt, who didn’t return this season as Houston’s coach, “required student-athletes to participate impermissibly in summer camps and pre-practice activities. The student-athletes’ participation in what should have been voluntary activity resulted in impermissible out-of-season activity and exceeding in-season hourly limits.”
The NCAA also said that players on Platt’s team realized the forced participation was against NCAA rules but were afraid to report the violations because of potential retaliation. If Platt is hired at another school she must be suspended for 30 percent of the team’s matches during the first year of the penalty period.
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Nick Bromberg is a writer for Yahoo Sports
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