Letter of Intent Violations

What's the penalty for a school recruiting a player who has already signed his letter of intent with another school?

 

None, seemingly, but the penalty is pretty stiff for the kid.

From National-Letter.org:

If you do not attend the institution with which you signed, or if you do not fulfill the terms of the National Letter of Intent, the basic penalty is that you lose one year of eligibility in all sports and must serve one year in residence at your next National Letter of Intent institution.

 

If I'm not mistaken, they must pay for a year of school, too (which basically works out to paying for their redshirt year, in most instances). Someone correct me if I'm wrong.

 

Thanks guys. I knew if the kid opts out, or changes his mind, he/she loses.

But my question is this: What happens to, say, UNC if its basketball coach keeps recruiting/calling/emailing a basketball player who has signed a letter of intent to attend Duke?

Because the LOI.org site says opposing schools cannot have contact with a kid who has signed elsewhere.

 

Certainly an NCAA violation, though the penalties would vary. Probably would at least include some sort of limitation on official contacts and/or visits, but probably not a loss of scholarships.

I thought this thread was going to be about Nick Saban ...

 

This may sound dumb, but I've always wondered and never been sure: What purpose does signing a NLOI fulfill for an athlete? What do they get out of it? Why not just pick a school, tell the coaches you're coming, show up in the fall like every other freshman, but do it all without signing the letter?

 

Not signing it means no scholarship. They would otherwise be a walk-on. And there's only so many athletic scholarships to go 'round.

 

Athletes don't have to sign an LOI. They can sign a "financial aid agreement" outside of the LOI period, which gurantees the school will provide a scholarship IF/WHEN THE ATHLETE SHOWS UP.

There is no limit to how many of these things you can sign, and no obligation to show. It's customarily done for late transfers, or for those who qualify over the summer, outside an LOI period.

And I think if you sign an LOI, but do not attend that school or any other school for a full year, the LOI becomes void, with no penalty. Or at least that was the case 10 years ago, when an athlete I know signed with a Big Sky school, then sat out and went elsewhere a year later because the coach who signed her got a better job and she wanted to follow the coach, but the Big Sky school wouldn't release her.

 

It still works that way. Also, if I remember right, a player can only sign one. So if a player signs with a school then fails to qualify and heads to JUCO, I don't think he can sign another LOI when he transfers out of the JUCO. I may be wrong on that though.

If I was being recruited, there's no way I'd sign an LOI. No way in hell. With coaches moving like they do now, it's too risky.

 

It is an NCAA violation to knowingly recruit a student-athlete who has signed a National Letter of Intent.

A student-athlete who signs a NLI and tries to back out of it, could forfeit a year of eligibility and is technically ineligible for aid at another institution in the NLI program for two years.

The NLI program is a voluntary program run by the Collegiate Commissioner's Association, a group consisting of the Division I conferences. Schools don't have to take part in it, but if they don't, they also can't benefit from it.

As for the student-athlete, there really is no benefit to signing the NLI. The NLI is invalid without a signed financial aid form that comes with it. A prospective student-athlete would be better off signing the financial aid form and not the NLI, which would bind the school to him but not him to the school.

For example, Terrell Prior signed a NLI on March 19 to go to Ohio State. Had he waited two more weeks -- until after April 1 -- the signing period for football would have been over and he only could have signed a scholarship agreement. That way, he could have signed a scholarship agreement with every school in the Top 25 and then could have waited all summer to decide where to go to school. He wouldn't have been bound to any of them -- under NCAA rules -- until he enrolled and attended his first class at a school.

 

Yikes!

 

The Letter of Intent program is a year to year thing. Every new year is a new beginning.

A student-athlete can sign a letter of intent to play football at one school and to play basketball at another, with the only penalty being that if he went to the school he signed with second, he would be ineligible to play the sport he signed for first.

If a kid signs with Duke and then does not qualify and goes to a JUCO, he can sign a letter of intent again the following year, two years later and even three years later if he'd like.

Collegejournalist: The NLI program is basically a quid pro quo. You agree to play here and we agree to give you a scholarship. Unless you were an elite athlete, a school would simply recruit past you if you refused to sign an NLI. (If Coach K needs a point guard and wants to sign you, he has o much at stake if he doesn't get a point guard to actually show up and play so he'd sign the next guy on his list. You might be able to indeed go to college and play hoops without signing a NLI, but you'll end up at Bemidji State.