Mark Gottfried was awarded a 3-year NCAA offer

Former Alabama basketball player and coach Mark Gottfried received a three-year injunction from the NCAA for violations that occurred while he coached at Cal State-Northridge.

Gottfried, 58, and two former assistants were “found to have unauthorized on- and off-campus contacts with prospects during the COVID-19 recruiting period and provided these prospects with unauthorized enlistment inducements,” according to a released NCAA Infractions Committee report. Friday. Gottfried was placed on administrative leave by CSUN in April 2021 after the allegations first came to light.

The NCAA found that Gottfried, two former assistant coaches and an alumni director, hosted prospects for campus and facility tours during the COVID shutdown, when recruiting was not permitted on or off campus for health and safety reasons. Gottfried was found to have violated the coach’s liability rules due to his “personal participation in the violations and his failure to monitor his staff”.

“This case involved deliberate violations by coaches with decades of experience,” the Violations Committee wrote in its decision. “The violations also occurred during the COVID-19 recruitment period, meaning that the coaches’ actions endangered the health and safety of a number of individuals while, at the same time, gaining a recruiting advantage over compliant (schools).

According to the report:

During the prospect’s first visit, the former head coach and one of his assistants arranged for a graduate manager to drive the prospect from his hotel to campus, where the prospect toured the campus facilities and met with the head coach and assistant coaches. He then drove the prospect to an off-campus restaurant, He paid for the lead’s meal, then drove the lead to his hotel.

The next day, additional violations occurred. The graduate director drove the prospect to a local establishment for breakfast, where they met a student-athlete in men’s basketball at the time. The alumni director then led the group back to campus, where the prospect received a second campus tour and met again with the head coach and one assistant coach. The prospect later meets the head coach on an off-campus basketball court, where the coach witnesses him participating in an impermissible tryout. Finally, on the third day of the visit, the head coach met the prospect at an off-campus restaurant, where he purchased his meal and then arranged for a booster to drive the prospect to a religious service.”

…

During the prospect’s second visit, a second assistant coach arranged for the prospect and his mother to visit campus unauthorized, where they met the head coach and both assistant coaches and then toured the campus facilities with the assistant coach and alumni director. After the tour, he met the head coach. and the assistant coach both by the prospect and his mother at an off-campus restaurant, where the coach purchased their meals. Again, in addition to impermissible personal contacts, the meals constitute impermissible recruiting incentives.

The School, Assistant Coach, and Enforcement Team also agree that during the same month, an Assistant Coach had unauthorized contact with a then-current student-athlete at another school before that prospect officially entered the transfer portal. The Assistant Coach continued to communicate with the prospect. after being notified by the compliance department that the student-athlete was not in the transfer gate and the contact violated NCAA rules.”

If Gottfried gets another job at an NCAA member school before his offer expires, he and school officials will have to appear before the NCAA Committee on Infractions.

Gottfried will also be suspended for 40% of his senior season at another school after his offer expires, if hired by another NCAA member school. He was already serving the cause of a one-year waiver — set to expire Dec. 20 — for NCAA violations that occurred while he was head coach at North Carolina State from 2011-17.

CSUN was also given three years of probation, fined $5,000 and placed restrictions on recruiting. Former assistant coaches have received two-year display orders.

Gottfried — who played guard on Alabama’s highly successful teams in the late 1980s — went 37-51 in three seasons at Northridge, a member of the Big West Conference. He has an overall record of 438-292 in 24 seasons as head coach at Murray State, Alabama, NC State and CSUN, with 11 NCAA Tournament spots and an Elite Eight finish with the Crimson Tide in 2004.