NCAA Violations Committed by the Longhorn Network

A good number of our previous posts have involved the controversy that surrounds the Longhorn Network.  It was a hot button topic during the summer with the possibility of airing high school student-athlete football games in which Longhorn commitments and recruits were playing in and the apparent recruiting advantage the network gave to the University of Texas.  This discussion then spilled over to conference realignment.  Many took the position that the Longhorn Network would never be a recruiting advantage to the University of Texas and its athletic programs.  Below we present not only evidence of recruiting advantages, but also NCAA violations the compliance office at the University of Texas should be reporting to the NCAA that occurred with the help of the Longhorn Network.

Our first violation occurs on the Longhorn Network twitter account when the official twitter page for the network re-tweets a tweet from 2012 quarterback Connor Brewer who is currently committed to play for the university next fall.

Brewer tweeted:

"Coach Brown and Harsin just left my house.  Leaves no doubt Texas was the right decision"

Many of our readers are aware that a twitter user who is a fan or booster for any particular university is allowed to "follow" and "re-tweet" a football recruit, but is unable to message them through a direct message or "@" message.  So then what is the violation here?

According to NCAA rule 13.02.14, the Longhorn Network is seen as a "Representative of Athletic Interests":


13.02.14 Representative of Athletics Interests. A “representative of the institution’s athletics interests”
is an individual, independent agency, corporate entity (e.g., apparel or equipment manufacturer) or other organization
who is known (or who should have been known) by a member of the institution’s executive or athletics administration to: (Revised: 2/16/00)
(a) Have participated in or to be a member of an agency or organization promoting the institution’s intercollegiate
athletics program;
(b) Have made financial contributions to the athletics department or to an athletics booster organization of that
institution;
(c) Be assisting or to have been requested (by the athletics department staff) to assist in the recruitment of prospective
student-athletes;
(d) Be assisting or to have assisted in providing benefits to enrolled student-athletes or their families; or
(e) Have been involved otherwise in promoting the institution’s athletics program.

Such a representative, as deemed above, is unable to mention the name of any particular student-athlete a university might be recruiting until that student-athlete has signed their Letter of Intent with that university.  It is the same rule that forbids a coach to speak about a recruit by name until national signing day.

On the weekend of December 10th, the University of Texas hosted many of its football verbal commitments for the 2012 recruiting class as well as other recruits on their official visits.  One of the recruiting stops?  The studios of the Longhorn Network.

We would like to remind you that the Longhorn Network studios are located near but not on the University of Texas campus:

The joint ESPN/University of Texas cable channel, which is set to launch Aug. 26 and will provide round-the-clock coverage of Longhorns sports, will be based out of an eight-story office building at the University Park development, 3300 Interstate 35 N. The site was selected, network officials said, because of its proximity to the UT campus and because there is room to expand. via

Also,  there is precedent for a recruiting violation here when the University of Tennessee reported the University of Connecticut for giving then recruit Maya Moore a tour of the ESPN studios off campus during her recruiting visit to the school in 2008.

ESPN acknowledges that it agreed to UConn's request to give Moore and her mother a tour. ESPN's headquarters in Bristol are located approximately 45 miles from UConn's campus. ESPN released a statement today saying, "To avoid future incidents, our tour policy will now prohibit high school athletes from receiving tours at the request of a college or university athletic official."

The tour was considered an impermissible benefit, although UConn says it did not receive any NCAA penalty for it. Tennessee had previously accused former UConn players of giving Moore car rides in violation of NCAA rules; the NCAA dismissed those accusations.

So what is the difference between these two instances?  We see none. 

This off-campus tour of the Longhorn Network studios would also be in violation of rule 13.4.3.4 as stated below:

13.4.3.4 Miscellaneous Promotions. Member institutions and their representatives of athletics interests are prohibited from financing, arranging or using recruiting aids (e.g., newspaper advertisements, bumper stickers, message buttons) designed to publicize the institution’s interest in a particular prospective student-athlete. [D] (Revised: 10/28/97)

In discussions with an NCAA compliance officer, it was revealed that the University of Texas Compliance Office should be looking into both cases for possible NCAA violations committed. 

It is time to erase the doubts that the Longhorn Network is not a recruiting advantage for the University of Texas and evidence continues to mount for the NCAA to take immediate action on the subject matter, something they should have done 9 months ago.