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Oregon Headed to Hearing After NCAA Negotiations Break Down

Oregon and the NCAA were unable to reach an agreement on summary disposition, Charles Robinson of Yahoo! Sports reports. That means that Oregon will go to a Committee on Infractions hearing, likely some time next spring:

In a response to the NCAA’s draft, Oregon altered language in a fashion that lessened its role in some of the proposed infractions. Those changes included one key edit that appeared to focus blame on Lyles for not providing the written scouting services for which Oregon said it paid the $25,000.

That disparity – and the total redaction of four other proposed violations — could reflect why Oregon and the NCAA’s committee on infractions have not been able to come to terms and now must head to a hearing.

The fact that Oregon and the NCAA disagreed on draft language suggests that the case had not yet gone in front of the Committee on Infractions for review. Given the level of scrutiny and amount of information made public in this case, if the NCAA and Oregon had agreed on findings and penalties, it would have likely come out at some point.

That said, summary disposition in this case was always going to be unlikely. This is the first major case under the new recruiting and scouting service guidelines. It seems unlikely that the school and the NCAA would ever agree on how to deal with the case given its novelty. Even if they did agree, it is hard to see the Committee on Infractions passing up the opportunity to rule on essentially the first case in a new area.


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