The Kansas Jayhawks basketball program waited years for their NCAA case to reach a resolution, and that day finally came on Wednesday with Bill Self evading the harsh punishments that many around the game expected to see.
Six years ago, an FBI investigation into corruption at some of college basketball’s top men’s programs led to schools like Arizona, Oklahoma State, LSU, Auburn, Louisville and Kansas coming under intense NCAA scrutiny. Among those cases, the NCAA charged Kansas with five Level I violations for corrupt recruiting practices with Adidas and a lack of institutional control.
The charges concerned three players – Billy Preston, Silvio De Sousa and Zion Williamson. Only one of which (De Sousa) appeared in a game for Kansas. Rather than arguing the case through the NCAA, Kansas went through the Independent Accountability Resolution Process (IARP) in hopes of a more lenient punishment.
Those hopes were realized on Wednesday.
From the IARP: #KUbball 2018 Final Four banner will be coming down along with all the 2017-18 wins vacated due to Silvio De Sousa playing while ineligible.
Here all the details on the penalties for both #KUbball and #KUfball pic.twitter.com/qBsz5V1rMb
— Shreyas Laddha (@shre98) October 11, 2023
The most serious of the penalties had Kansas vacating 15 wins from the 2017-18 season and taking down a 2018 Final Four banner as De Sousa was part of that team in the second half of the season. That would also drop Kansas back to second in the all-time wins list behind Kentucky. Kansas was also hit with three years of probation.
But given how Kansas could have been looking at postseason bans or a show-cause for Self, the lenient nature of the penalties had plenty of college hoops fans shocked.
This was how Twitter reacted
Bill Self started this process being charged with 5 Level I violations, and ended it with just one Level 3 violation. https://t.co/ZgsDi806Ej
— Jeff Goodman (@GoodmanHoops) October 11, 2023
NCAA enforcement came after Bill Self and he responded by winning a national title, securing a lifetime contract and then convincing them a previously served four game suspension/vacation was more than enough.
Self has won a lot of games, none by a wider margin than that.
— Dan Wetzel (@DanWetzel) October 11, 2023
Slap on the wrist for Kansas:
The hearing panel found two Level II violations and two Level III violations of NCAA legislation for
the institutionOne Level II violation and one Level III violation for
the assistant coach and one Level III violation for Bill Self https://t.co/4Lmgqs1VU1— Adam Zagoria (@AdamZagoria) October 11, 2023
KU went 15-5 with Silvio. That’s a 75% winning percentage.
Bill Self career winning percentage: 76.9%
Bill Self at Kansas: 81.4%
The vacation of those 20 games actually improves Bill Self’s record. 😂😂😂
The guy is hilariously good.
— Talkin’ Hawks (@TalkinHawks) October 11, 2023
Soooo basically, KU and Bill Self got a, “Yeah, so don’t do that again!” from the NCAA? Lol
— Andrew Hammond (@ahammALDC) October 11, 2023
Bill Self defeated the whole NCAA 🐐#kubball
— Jeffrey Darland (@Hefe_Weizen_) October 11, 2023
200 bucks at a BBQ? This is much more severe than Harbaugh’s cheeseburger. The NCAA should have closed the university. Disgusting. https://t.co/69WEm2MgzR
— RedditCFB (@RedditCFB) October 11, 2023
The moral of the story: those who cooperated with the NCAA and didn't go before the IARP got slammed. Those who fought the allegations and went to the IARP made it through mostly unscathed.
— Kevin Flaherty (@KFlaherty247) October 11, 2023
The NCAA punishing Kansas basketball: pic.twitter.com/s0fT8xXFXq
— Pregame Empire (@PregameEmpire) October 11, 2023
Aaaaand there it is.
Oklahoma State – the school with the least allegations both in number and severity – is the only one to get any sort of real punishment – and it was extreme.
All because they did the right thing and cooperated with the NCAA.
Disgusted, but not surprised. https://t.co/KdFfm14b4x
— Tyler Wiederhoeft (@TDWiederhoeft) October 11, 2023
The NCAA is the worst organization in America and it’s not even close 😂 pic.twitter.com/uH8ARLZpNm
— TigerWill (@TigerWill06) October 11, 2023
The NCAA spent four years figuring out how to add a shrug emoji onto an official document. https://t.co/w1LViJAE3Z
— Brandon Kiley (@BKSportsTalk) October 11, 2023
