SPARTANBURG, S.C. — The NCAA has placed the Wofford men's basketball team on probation for a year after finding it failed to oversee the program when former coach Jay McAuley regularly had players participate in team activities on days off.
Wofford, McAuley and the NCAA reached a negotiated agreement, the details of which were released Friday.
McAuley, who resigned during the 2022-23 season, agreed to a two-year order to show cause. McAuley is currently a high school coach at Georgia. If he returns to the college ranks while the order is in effect, the school would have to suspend him for 15 games in his first season.
The NCAA also fined Wofford $5,000.
Wofford President Nayef H. Samhat received a letter from players in December 2022 saying they would no longer play for McAuley, who regularly required film studies, walk-throughs and individual workouts beyond the NCAA’s 20-hour weekly limit.
Wofford's investigation showed that McAuley forced players to work on days that the program told the school's compliance office were days off.
“Wofford College cooperated fully with the NCAA in reaching the publicly negotiated resolution and respects the outcome,” the school said in a statement.
The NCAA determined that McAuley committed the violations “a majority of weeks during the championship segment of the season’s play” in 2021-22 and 2022-23 until the school placed him on leave on Dec. 5, 2022. He resigned later that month in the middle of his third season at Wofford.
The NCAA said that after a loss in November 2022, McAuley had the team review video of the next opponent, violating rules against such actions after games. He had a player meet with him after midnight, also violating NCAA rules.
The NCAA said Wofford, a school of fewer than 2,000 students, did not have “adequate compliance monitoring systems to deter and detect” violations.
The NCAA shortened Wofford's countable preseason practice days for the upcoming season from 30 to 25 and its countable weekly hours for team-related activities from 20 to 18.
Coach Dwight Perry, a former McAuley assistant, will begin his second full season this fall.
