The University of Kentucky reached an agreement Friday with NCAA regarding violations in the football and swimming programs that will see the school vacate 10 football wins from the 2021 season.
The agreement related to impermissible benefits that occurred in the football program and rules violations involving countable athletically related activities that occurred within the swimming program, as well as the appropriate penalties for those violations.
Kentucky agreed that the violations in the swimming program supported findings of a failure to monitor, and head coach responsibility violations. A Committee on Infractions panel has approved the agreement. One former coach did not participate in the agreement, and that portion of the case will be considered separately by the Committee on Infractions, after which the committee will release its full decision.
The agreed-upon violations involve at least 11 football student-athletes receiving payment for work not performed between spring 2021 and March 2022. Eight of the student-athletes went on to compete and receive actual and necessary expenses while ineligible. The enforcement staff and school agreed that no staff member in the athletics department knew or reasonably should have known about the payment for work not performed, and thus the violations involving the football program did not provide additional support for the agreed-upon failure-to-monitor violation.
Additional agreed-upon violations involve the men's and women's swimming program exceeding limits on countable athletically related activities when student-athletes were not provided with required days off and exceeded practice hours for nearly three years.
“We respect the decision, and we are going to uphold the integrity that has marked UK Athletics for decades,” said UK president Eli Capilouto.
UK athletic director Mitch Barnhart told WKYT, that the school's processes worked and their compliance office has been working towards a solution for years now.
“We have been supremely focused on putting rings on fingers and diplomas in hands,” said Barnhart. “This does not diminish any of that”
