Jeff Greer

@jeffgreer_cj

The NCAA enforcement staff isn't budging on allegations made against Rick Pitino in the University of Louisville's ongoing case that is soon to go before the organization's committee on infractions.

Released Thursday, the NCAA's formal response disputes U of L's case against the failure-to-monitor charge facing Pitino regarding the illicit actions of former director of basketball operations Andre McGee.

The NCAA's charge could result in a suspension for Pitino if the infractions committee sides with the enforcement staff. No date has been set yet for the hearing.

"Pitino did not conduct frequent spot checks to uncover potential or existing compliance problems as it relates to McGee's interactions with prospects and student-athletes," the NCAA wrote in its response. "Pitino failed to demonstrate that he actively looked for red flags, asked pointed questions or even occasionally solicited honest feedback from McGee about activities occurring under his supervision. These are basic elements of a head coach's obligation to monitor. If Pitino saw no red flags in connection with McGee's interactions with then prospective and current student-athletes, it was because he was not looking for them."

U of L disputed the allegation specifically against Pitino in its earlier response to the NCAA notice of allegations but has largely acknowledged the remainder of what was alleged by the NCAA, meaning the upcoming committee on infractions hearing – the next step in the case – will likely focus on the allegation against Pitino.

"The enforcement staff is asking the (committee on infractions) to suspend Coach Pitino for up to a full season for not uncovering secretly concealed violations (by McGee) that the enforcement staff itself struggled to uncover," Pitino's counsel argued in his January response to the NCAA.

In its reply, the NCAA cited interviews with former assistant coaches Mike Balado, Tim Fuller, Wyking Jones and Kevin Keatts in arguing that Pitino's staff was not aware of its responsibility to monitor McGee. Balado, who was interviewed by the NCAA while he was still on staff at U of L and took the Arkansas State head coaching job on Monday, was the only former staff member who told the NCAA that Pitino asked about activities in Minardi Hall, the on-campus basketball dormitory where many of the incidents allegedly took place.

Keatts, now the head coach at NC State, told NCAA investigators that "everybody assumed everybody was doing the right thing." Jones, the interim head coach at California, told the NCAA he "did not feel he was responsible for monitoring any other staff members' compliance with NCAA rules."

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"Pitino cannot completely delegate away responsibility for activities involving McGee's interactions with prospects and student-athletes or their activities in Minardi," the NCAA wrote in its response. "Even if he believed it was possible or advisable to task assistant coaches with the ultimate responsibility for monitoring McGee, those assistant coaches appear to have been unaware of that expectation."

The NCAA's reply otherwise reiterated many of the allegations laid out in the original notice, though it hashed out the reason for including former program assistant Brandon Williams in its notice of allegations.

Enforcement staffers suspect Williams was responsible for collecting money McGee wired in the summer of 2014, when he was already working as an assistant coach at UMKC, to pay for an alleged meeting between a recruit and escort Katina Powell, the author of the book that prompted the NCAA's investigation.

Powell claimed in her book, "Breaking Cardinal Rules: Basketball and the Escort Queen," that the recruit was former U of L pledge Antonio Blakeney, who signed with LSU and is still on that team.

The NCAA said Williams fit Powell's description of the individual who paid her $200 outside Minardi Hall in 2014. It also questioned why Williams deleted contacts and data from one of his cellphones; gave U of L a phone not associated with the NCAA's request; and obtained a new phone less than a month before information was extracted from it by NCAA and U of L investigators.

Williams said the NCAA was conducting an "unreasonable and inappropriate fishing expedition."

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The members of the infractions committee will now begin the process of reviewing the case documents provided by U of L and the NCAA before the hearing, which is similar to a court proceeding.

It is after that hearing that the committee recommends potential penalties.

U of L self-imposed a postseason ban for the 2015-16 campaign and docked scholarships and official recruiting visits, hoping to mitigate future punishment. The school also cited its cooperation with NCAA investigators as reason for mitigation, but the enforcement staff countered that U of L simply did what was required in the organization's bylaws.

U of L also argued in its response that the value of impermissible benefits provided by McGee totaled $4,500 over a four-year period, not the $5,400 (plus $805 more in cash tips) that the NCAA alleged.

The school's goal is to fight the case on those terms, focusing on the monetary value of the impermissible benefits and comparing that to other schools' cases. But the NCAA enforcement staff didn't buy it.

"Regardless of the values assigned to each violation," the NCAA said, "the enforcement staff asserts that a staff member arranging and funding adult entertainers and escorts to provide prospects and student-athletes adult entertainment, oral sex and sexual intercourse on campus is clearly Level I behavior and much more severe than the examples of free coaching, meals, lodging, golf, etc. that the institution cites in support of its position."

How the committee on infractions views those two arguments will go a long way toward how it hands down its decision.

READ THE NCAA'S RESPONSE: