The National Collegiate Association, formed in 1906, regulates the college athletic departments. The NCAA makes sure rules and regulations are established. They also take into account the player interactions and other aspects of college sports, according to britannica.com.

Southern Methodist University Football
On Feb. 25, 1987, the SMU, Division I Mustangs became the only team to be given the “death penalty” by the NCAA for their repeated rule violations. The team’s scandal was heavily focused on their use of a slush fund to pay their players and recruits, meaning they used the money for illicit purposes and even bribery on their members, according to history.com.

The NCAA cancelled the Mustangs’ 1987 season and heavily reduced the number of football scholarships that were handed out for the next two seasons. SMU was also not allowed to either host or play home games. The university then chose to also not play during 1988, according to history.com.

Collegiate Point Shaving
Between the years 1946 and 1950, 33 players from seven different schools were involved in point shaving. Point shaving is when a player is purposely scoring less points to illegally affect the results of a game, or even arranging for this to take place, according to cambridge.org.

In 1951, the City College of New York, Division III Beavers were accused of a gambling scandal that used both match fixing and bribery at other universities in New York City. They were eventually banned from playing in the Madison Square Garden, de-emphasized their athletics, and moved down to Division III, according to espn.com.

Also in 1951, the Long Island University, Division I basketball player’s Sherman White, LeRoy Smith and Adolph Bigos were arrested for taking bribes to make their team purposely lose in games, according to espn.com.

White was the nation’s top-scorer in 1951 and was only 77 points away from becoming the NCAA’s leading scorer. After the controversy, White was forced to drop out of college and had to give up many of his awards and honors. He also served eight months in jail and was banned from the NBA. This caused LIU to shut down their athletics program from 1951-1957, according to espn.com.

The College of William and Mary
Another 1951 incident occurred in the College of William and Mary. During this time, the college was stressed about their succession in sports, particularly football, baseball and men’s basketball. Nelson Marshall, the college dean, began an investigation and later uncovered many issues, including people giving grades to sports players who had not even signed up for the classes they had grades for. He then informed the school’s president, John Pomfret, in April of 1951. The faculty revolted which led to the school downgrading their football and their team not being allowed to attend the Atlantic Coast Conference, according to YouTube video “William and Mary’s Massive Scandals of 1951” by Wronged Sports.

The College of William and Mary had another scandal in 2020. The college announced they were going to be eliminating seven different sports teams because of financial reasons. The teams included both men and women’s gymnastics, men’s indoor and outdoor track, men and women’s swimming, and women’s volleyball. The school eventually had to reinstate all seven sports in November 2020, according to 13newsnow.com.

Vanderbilt Football Players
Vanderbilt University, Division I football player Brandon Banks had received a minimum sentence of at least 15 years in prison for the rape of an unconscious female student, which a teammate recorded and later shared. Banks was convicted of rape and sexual battery in 2013. Prosecutors said they had asked the judge for a longer sentence, but they refused because “they were not surprised.” When this trial came up, two former players had similar charges, according to espn.com.

Banks began to blame others for the rape that had happened and tried to make himself be portrayed as the victim, rather than the perpetrator. The victim then wrote that Banks also went to college campuses with rape charges pending against him to give his perspective of what happened to other male athletes. On a later date, Banks finally admitted what he had done, but that he was forced into it, according to espn.com.

It was stated that in the video, other players’ laughter could be heard in the background. In which, prosecutors showed the videos to go against his arguments, showing he did it by choice, according to espn.com.