The NCAA is penalizing us for things such as this? And this is minor violations. Sidney's case will never clear if they are looking for this much detail. The NCAA really does not like us
</p>
</p>
<font size="2" face="Georgia">Mississippi State's men's basketball coaches won't be allowed to attend off-campus recruiting events during the first two days of the July 2010 evaluation period after the school self-reported a secondary violation in September.
State found the violation when fulfilling an information request from the NCAA. On Sept, 4, a representative of the Basketball Focus Group wrote a letter to the school saying the men's basketball coaching staff may have violated NCAA Bylaw 11, part of which deals with the number of coaches that can be off-campus recruiting at any one time.
In fulfilling the NCAA's request for recruiting logs, the school found that on July 26, head coach Rick Stansbury started evaluating an event in Nevada "approximately 15 minutes" before assistant Marcus Grant ended his evaluation of an event in Florida. "Our inquiry indicates the violation resulted from a 'time zone' confusion on the part of Coach Stansbury," wrote Bracky Brett, State's associate athletic director for compliance, to the Southeastern Conference in his letter reporting the violation.
"It is our understanding that penalty will be accepted," Brett said this morning, adding that he has received no indication that anything more will come from the violation.
The Basketball Focus Group is a separate arm of the NCAA's enforcement efforts that is looking only into basketball recruiting. Brett said he had heard of similar letters sent to other schools across the country after the July evaluation period.
The Clarion-Ledger reported in July that Southern Miss and North Carolina State had received letters from the group inquiring about potential violations involving Mississippi recruits in 2008. Arkansas also received a similar letter, which was reported by media outlets there in March.
Also, Mississippi State's football team was docked two hours of offseason workouts in the summer when members of the coaching staff were in the same building as players conducting summer workouts. Coaches aren't allowed to be present at those workouts.
An NCAA enforcement staff member's letter said the players moved inside the Shira Complex during a June 10 thunderstorm to complete their drills. On the other end of the building, coaches were registering summer camp participants.
The documents were obtained today by The Clarion-Ledger through a public records request.</font>