Source: KU, Self hit with major NCAA violations

5:36 PM ET

The NCAA’s enforcement staff has charged the University of Kansas with lack of institutional control and Jayhawks basketball coach Bill Self with head coach responsibility violations, a source confirmed to ESPN on Monday.

Those are among the most serious charges levied against Kansas and Self in an NCAA notice of allegations that the university received on Monday. The Jayhawks are charged with multiple violations, including allegations related to the school’s football program under former coach David Beaty.

Yahoo Sports first reported details of the allegations on Monday.

Under NCAA rules, Kansas officials have 90 days to respond to the charges. Sources have told ESPN that Self and Kansas officials plan to fight the allegations.

Self, 56, has guided Kansas to at least a share of 14 consecutive Big 12 regular-season titles, three Final Four appearances and the 2008 NCAA championship. He was president of the National Association of Basketball Coaches in 2017-18.

NCAA bylaw 11.1.1.1 states that a “head coach is presumed to be responsible for the actions of all staff members who report, directly or indirectly, to the head coach. The head coach will be held accountable for violations in the program unless he or she can rebut the presumption of responsibility.”

Under NCAA rules, a head coach can receive a show-cause order and be suspended up to an entire season for Level I violations and up to half a season for Level II violations. The length of the suspension is determined by the Committee on Infractions and depends on the “severity of the violation(s) committed, the level of the coach’s involvement and any other aggravating or mitigating factors.”

According to sources, of utmost concern to the NCAA enforcement staff is the Kansas coaching staff’s relationship with Adidas and its employees. The sneaker company was at the center of a federal investigation into bribes and other corruption in college basketball over the past two years. The Jayhawks are the company’s flagship program and signed a 14-year, $196 million apparel and sponsorship extension in April.

Earlier this month, former Adidas consultant T.J. Gassnola was sentenced to probation and fined for his role in pay-for-play schemes to steer recruits to Kansas and other Adidas-sponsored programs.

During closing arguments in a federal criminal case in New York in October, an attorney for former Adidas executive James Gatto told a jury that his client approved a $20,000 payment to current Kansas player Silvio De Sousa‘s guardian only after Self and Jayhawks assistant Kurtis Townsend requested the payment through Gassnola.

Gatto, former Adidas consultant Merl Code and aspiring business manager Christian Dawkins were found guilty on felony charges of wire fraud and conspiracy to commit wire fraud.

The three were accused of paying money from Adidas to the families of recruits to ensure they signed with Adidas-sponsored schools and then with the sneaker company and certain financial planners and agents once they turned pro.

Gatto was accused of working with Gassnola to facilitate $90,000 from Adidas to former Jayhawks recruit Billy Preston’s mother and agreeing to pay $20,000 to Fenny Falmagne, De Sousa’s guardian, to help him “get out from under” a pay-for-play scheme to attend Maryland, which is sponsored by Under Armour.

Gassnola testified during the trial that Self and his assistants weren’t aware of the alleged payments.

On Sept. 19, 2017, three days before Kansas announced the 14-year extension with Adidas, Gassnola texted Self and thanked him for helping the sponsorship deal get done.

Self responded: “I’m happy with Adidas. Just got to get a couple real guys.”

Gassnola replied: “In my mind, it’s KU, bill self. Everyone else fall into line. Too f—ing bad. That’s what’s right for Adidas basketball. And I know I am RIGHT. The more you win, have lottery pics and you happy. That’s how it should work in my mind.”

Gassnola, a former youth basketball director from Springfield, Massachusetts, pleaded guilty in April 2018 to conspiracy to commit wire fraud for his role in the alleged pay-for-play schemes. He testified during the October trial as part of his cooperation agreement with federal prosecutors.

The NCAA had previously alleged that Gassnola and Adidas were representatives of NC State’s athletics interests when Gassnola provided $40,000 in cash to then-assistant coach Orlando Early in November 2015 to ensure star guard Dennis Smith Jr.’s commitment to the Wolfpack.

Josephine Potuto, a professor at the University of Nebraska College of Law and a former chair of the NCAA Committee on Infractions, said a corporation like Adidas might fit under the NCAA’s definition of boosters.

Under NCAA rules, an individual or entity can be identified as a booster if they “assisted or has been requested by the university staff to assist in the recruitment of prospective student-athletes.”

“Typically, when you think about a booster, you think of somebody who is trying to assist a particular school,” Potuto said, while not specifically talking about Kansas or any of the other schools involved in the federal government’s investigation into college basketball corruption. “That’s the normal definition and the normal way you think about it, but it’s not exclusive.

“To the extent that one of the shoe companies was providing payments to a prospect or to the family members of a prospect, and the interest was getting the prospect to attend a particular school, that would sound as though that would fall within that [booster] provision.”

David Ridpath, president of the Drake Group, a think tank dedicated to protecting academic integrity in college sports, and an associate professor of sports business at Ohio University, said it’s too early to tell whether the NCAA can make a dent in cleaning up college basketball corruption.

“[The notice of allegations] is not surprising,” Ridpath said. “But it’s one thing to allege and another to know what’s going to be the end game. I think we saw that in the North Carolina case [involving alleged academic misconduct]. I have my doubts that the membership really truly, truly wants to punish these schools and punish coaches like Bill Self. At the end of the day, whether he knew or didn’t know, he should have known or did know. My guess is Bill Self probably knew a lot more that he’s letting on.

“If we’re going to have these rules, they need to be enforced. Until we see the end game, I don’t know how worried Kansas should be about these allegations because it still has to go through the infractions process. The committee on infractions has shown in the past that it’s very reticent to punish some schools. We’ll have to wait and see. If they’re doing their job, Kansas should be absolutely eviscerated.”