Report: Tennessee under NCAA investigation for multiple 'major' NIL violations across several sports

The University of Tennessee is under NCAA investigation for multiple “major” NIL violations across the athletic department, according to SI’s Pat Forde.

“The University of Tennessee is immersed in another NCAA investigation of potential rules violations that is ‘major’ in nature, sources tell Sports Illustrated,” Forde wrote. The case involves multiple sports and includes scrutiny of name, image and likeness (NIL) benefits for athletes.”

Just last summer, Tennessee was penalized for more than 200 rules infractions in the football program. Now, there is reportedly more to come.

According to Forde, details are scarce but the penalties could be severe since this isn’t the school’s first rodeo.

“Details are scarce on what Tennessee is potentially facing in the latest case, including the number of involved sports,” Forde wrote. “The school acknowledged the investigation to SI, but declined further comment, other than to say it has not received a notice of allegations from NCAA Enforcement … A source familiar with the inquiry tells SI that Tennessee does not believe it has committed any violations in the NIL realm. The source cited NCAA guidance in that evolving area as ‘vague and contradictory.'”

The NCAA also released a statement to SI.

“With rare exceptions, the NCAA does not comment on current, pending or potential investigations due to confidentiality rules put in place by member schools,” associate director of communications Meghan Durham Wright said.

As of now, it’s unclear why Tennessee’s NIL agreements are targets of the NCAA inquiry. The Knoxville Nes-Sentinel reported Spyre Sports struck deals with Tennessee athletes across 11 sports and the Volunteer Club said it had more than 4,000 members as of December.

“Despite the egregious nature of the football violations in the previous case, the Committee on Infractions chose not to hit Tennessee with a postseason ban for the 2023 season, citing a relatively recent aversion within the NCAA membership to penalizing athletes who were not involved or implicated in the infractions,” Forde wrote.

“Many believed that signaled the end of the NCAA doling out postseason bans, which had been considered the harshest penalties at the NCAA’s disposal. But could that change in this instance, in what could be a blatant ‘repeat violator’ case? That’s the NCAA’s nomenclature for a school that commits a Level I or II violation within five years of starting a penalty from a previous violation—and this would be two cases in a much shorter period of time.”

Tennessee, instead of a postseason ban this past college football season, was issued a fine of more than $8 million, according to the report. It also had a long list of recruiting restrictions and vacated 11 victories from 2019 and ’20 after the violations of the Jeremy Pruitt era.