A year after expanding the Big Sky Conference men’s basketball tournament field to include all 12 teams in the league, this year’s tournament in Reno, Nevada will feature 11.
On October 7, the Greely Tribune reported the Northern Colorado men’s basketball team have self-imposed penalties stemming from severe NCAA violations under former head coach B.J. Hill. The sanctions include a self-mandated postseason ban.
UNC guard Jordan Wilson (25)
“I don’t think anybody feels good about self-imposing penalties on a program,” UNC Athletic Director Darren Dunn told Sam Mustari of the Greeley Tribune. “I do feel good about the internal process we worked through to come up with the penalties we did.”
Because Northern Colorado’s season will end on the final day of the regular season, the Big Sky Tournament format will be altered. Instead of the top four teams receiving byes into the quarterfinals, the No. 5 team will receiving an automatic win in the first round because of UNC’s ensured 12th-place spot. The No. 4 and No. 5 seeds will play in the quarterfinals on the tournament’s fourth day.
Northern Colorado fired Hill on April 21 amid swirling allegations of “serious and concerning” NCAA violations in the UNC program. Northern Colorado President Kay Norton said in a news release that upon receiving information about allegations, the university hired an outside law firm to help with an internal investigation.
“After its initial work, the firm advised us to notify the NCAA of the issue, which we have done,” Norton said in a UNC press release. “The NCAA, which commended us for our preliminary inquiries and correctly following protocol, has joined us in the investigation into the matter. We have and will continue to cooperate fully with the NCAA.”
“Athletic director Darren Dunn and I are committed to ensuring the integrity of the men’s basketball program. In light of that commitment, and in the best interests of the program moving forward, we have made the difficult decision to terminate the contract of head coach B.J. Hill. We have placed the assistant coaches on administrative leave while we continue collaborating with the NCAA on the investigation.”
UNC forward Anthony Johnson (24)
Hill went 86-98 with two postseason appearances in six seasons at Northern Colorado. He led the Bears to the 2011 NCAA Tournament for the first and only time in school history. Former Boise State assistant Jeff Linder took over as UNC’s head coach on May 1.
UNC has not released the violations. The school awaits word from the NCAA if the self-imposed sanctions are acceptable. The penalties include the postseason ban for this season, a financial penalty of $5,000 plus two percent of the team’s budget.
The Bears will also be docked a total of three scholarships for the 2017-18 and 2018-19 academic years. UNC will get four fewer official visits to and from recruits, will be required a total of eight weeks prohibition on recruiting communications and will have 20 days’ reduction for off-campus recruiting activities.
Photos by Brooks Nuanez. All Rights Reserved.
