PITTSBURGH, PA - The University of Pittsburgh has been placed on
probation for three years for committing men's football and basketball
coaching violations, the NCAA announced Thursday.
In a joint
announcement by the NCAA and the university, Pitt admitted that current
football coach Pat Narduzzi and former basketball coach Kevin Stallings
each allowed non-staff members to perform coaching duties, resulting in
the program exceeding the number of permissible coaches.
Pitt
faces numerous penalties for the infractions, but will not be subject to
any scholarship reductions or postseason restrictions during the
probation, which expires in February 2023.
"While disappointed in the violations, I am
confident that our already-strong culture of compliance will help each
of our programs avoid such situations in the future.," Pitt athletic
director Heather Lyke said in a statement.
Among the violations:
• Between June 2016 and March 2018, the former head men's basketball coach (not named in the NCAA release but Stallings was the coach then) and permitted non-coaching staff members to regularly perform NCAA-defined coaching duties that included providing coaching instruction to men's basketball student-athletes at practice.
• At Stallings' direction, the men's basketball program actively attempted to hide the violations and intentionally deleted practice film to avoid detection of such violations.
• Between May 2017 and September 2017, the men's basketball program produced personalized recruiting videos for 12 men's basketball prospective student-athletes, showing the videos to prospects during their visits to campus.
• Between August 2015 and November 2017, Narduzzi was present at the football practice facility when three quality control members engaged in impermissible coaching activities, which included occasionally throwing footballs and holding play cards for the scout teams during practices.
"
I am wholeheartedly committed to following NCAA rules and preventing
these types of issues from happening again," Narduzzi said in a
statement. "I fully recognize my responsibility in what occurred and,
equally important, how those missteps will be corrected as we proceed
forward."
Pitt's penalties include fines consisting of $5,000 and
0.5 percent of the football and basketball budgets and Narduzzi
essentially being suspended for two days of team practices in August.