Oregon receives proposed findings from NCAA, Ducks failed to conform to recruiting rules

After months of questions around Oregon's recruiting practices and dealings with Will Lyles and other scouting services, we finally have some answers. This afternoon, Oregon released the "proposed findings of violations" presented to the athletic department from the NCAA. This full document (heavily redacted due to student privacy laws) makes clear that Oregon did not follow NCAA rules regarding recruiting.

The Ducks did not follow proper rules in dealing with scouting services, and also exceeded the permissible number of coaches that could be involved with a certain recruit. Unfortunately, the document does not say which recruit (or recruits) the Ducks were involved with while this occurred.

Here's one of the key sections of the document:

It is agreed that from 2008 through 2011, the scope and nature of the violations set forth in Finding Nos. 2, 3-C and 4 demonstrate that the athletics department failed to adequately monitor (1) the football program's use of recruiting or scouting services; [...]

Regarding the recruiting or scouting services, the athletics department failed to establish policies and procedures to monitor the football program's use of recruiting or scouting services. Additionally, athletics administrators with responsibilities in the football program failed to monitor the information provided by recruiting or scouting services to ensure compliance with recruiting or scouting service legislation.

What does this mean for the Ducks? No one seems to know at this point. Failure to monitor is a fairly common charge in any NCAA investigation. Oregon's compliance department dropped the ball, and failed to make sure that the coaches were complying with NCAA rules. What is more worrisome is that the compliance department signed off on the relationships with scouting services, indicating a massive failure on their part.

Still, despite this failure, Rob Mullens made clear today in a press release that the department was continuing to comply and work with the NCAA.

While this document is a bit disappointing, it's also pretty much exactly what I expected. This is what we knew, and it's very likely that Oregon will not face any serious violations, such as impermissible benefits.

Now we just wait to hear what the punishment will be, but at this point I don't think it will be anything too significant. Oregon has complied with the NCAA, and Oregon is learning from these mistakes and we will hopefully not see this kind of lapse in the future.

If I had to guess, I'd say we may see some coaches receive some recruiting restrictions, and we might lose a handful of scholarships, but I don't expect this to have any significant impact on the Ducks moving forward.