NCAA Accusing Will Wade of Arranging or Offering Payment to 11 Recruits

Published|Updated

It remains to be seen when the NCAA will get around to publicly announcing this, but leaked documents obtained by Mark Schlabach of ESPN indicate that the NCAA enforcement staff believes LSU basketball coach Will Wade "arranged for, offered and/or provided impermissible payments, including cash payments, to at least 11 men's basketball prospective student-athletes, their family members, individuals associated with the prospects and/or nonscholastic coaches in exchange for the prospects' enrollment at LSU."

This saga has been ongoing since March of 2019, when Yahoo Sports reported that the FBI had a wiretap of 2017 when Wade discussed a "strong-ass offer" to a recruit with middleman Christian Dawkins.

The fact that Wade and LSU stuck it out for an extra year-plus as all this was swirling was a fascinating response, and we honestly don't know how much longer the Power Five conferences are going to even be part of the NCAA before perhaps concluding to strike out on their own. Nonetheless, if the NCAA has the goods that they purport to, that time probably won't come soon enough for Wade and LSU to avoid pretty dire consequences for all this.



Tags
Written by
Ryan Glasspiegel grew up in Connecticut, graduated from University of Wisconsin-Madison, and lives in Chicago. Before OutKick, he wrote for Sports Illustrated and The Big Lead. He enjoys expensive bourbon and cheap beer.