Ohio State head coach Ryan Day prepares to lead the Buckeyes onto the field prior to the start of the game against Wisconsin Oct. 26. Ohio State won 38-3. Credit: Casey Cascaldo | Managing Editor for Multimedia
The Ohio State field hockey team played an ineligible player in 2018, and Ohio State football briefly lost contact with recruits due to “personalized itineraries.”
These are two of the Athletics Department’s 26 self-reported NCAA violations from January through September 2019, ranging from eligibility issues to the error of placing names on a schedule, according to Ohio State’s NCAA violation records.
Ohio State football accounted for nine of the self-reported violations. No other sport surpassed two. In total, 13 of the university’s 30 varsity sports reported at least one violation, with an additional violation reported by the camps and clinics department.
Names and personalized information of enrolled students were redacted from the report due to the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act, university spokesperson Ben Johnson said.
According to the report, the department self-imposed a range of sanctions, such as fines placed on teams and recruiting limitations, and provided education to coaches and athletes on NCAA policies. After receiving the reports, the NCAA decided no further action was necessary in 21 of the violations. Its decision is still pending in the other five.
A field hockey player competed for Ohio State during the 2018 season while in violation of the NCAA’s five-year rule — players have only five years to play four seasons at a university. The exact nature of the violation and why it occurred was redacted to protect the student-athlete’s privacy, Johnson said.
In response, the team paid a self-imposed fine of $5,000 to the NCAA and added safeguards against such errors in the future. Primarily, the university will begin the use of participation summaries, including a player’s date of enrollment, seasons participated and other eligibility information to provide easy access to their eligibility information. The NCAA decided no further action was necessary.
Of football’s nine violations, six were for impermissible contact with recruits.
Seven prospects from the 2021 class who scheduled unofficial visits to Ohio State received “personalized itineraries” for their visit from the team on June 13, 2019. It was unaware that by personalizing the tour guides, it turned them into recruiting correspondence, according to NCAA rules.
Recruits from the 2021 class were not permitted to receive recruiting correspondence until Sept. 1, 2019.
As a result, the team forfeited two weeks of correspondence with the recruits from Sept. 1 to 14.
Another violation occurred in August when a player was reimbursed $340 for preseason expenses, as opposed to the allowed $119. The player repaid the excess $221 to a charity of his choice and was ineligible until he underwent the NCAA’s reinstatement process.
Two women’s rowing athletes were declared ineligible after promoting a commercial product on their personal Instagram accounts without reference to their status as a student-athlete. In exchange, they received discounts on the product, one of which amounted to $72.
The university will seek reinstatement for both, who will repay the money they were discounted to a charity of their choice, according to the report.
Ohio State defensive line coach Larry Johnson and a men’s volleyball assistant coach violated NCAA policies on separate occasions when they sent text messages to two recruits outside of the appropriate time window. Both coaches believed the recruits were one cycle older than they were, according to the report.
The Athletics Department fired a men’s basketball student intern after a highlight reel was posted by the intern on social media regarding prospective Ohio State players.
