NCAA ban for buying brother's books

Published September 15, 2015

The NCAA may be terrible at doling out punishments where they're needed most (e.g., Miami, Oregon), but boy, are they good at cracking down on the little harmless rules.

Justin Heard, a senior linebacker at FCS Central Arkansas, recently was suspended indefinitely for reportedly giving several hundred dollars of his scholarship money to his brother, also a UCA student and member of the football team, to buy textbooks .

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"If it was an athletic scholarship that was given to the student, (the extra money) is the university's money and not the student's," UCA financial analyst Evonne Meeks told The Fountain, an online campus publication.

"Basically I didn't know it was a violation and later on found out and immediately went back and did the things I need to do to correct that and now I'm here facing possibly a long suspension from the NCAA and I just want to get it straightened out that I'm not a bad person," Heard, the Bears' leading tackler in 2012, told THV-11 .

When contacted by Lost Lettermen, the school's assistant AD for media relations, Steve East, would say only that Heard's suspension was due to "breaking team rules."

The masters of minutiae in Indianapolis also recently ruled a Middle Tennessee State defensive end had to sit out a year for participating in military intramurals and denied a hardship waiver to a Rutgers basketball player despite the death of his brother and father before coming to their senses and reversing both decisions.

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If the report is correct, hopefully the NCAA can use common sense once more to retract this suspension.

[ The Fountain ]

URL

https://www.foxnews.com/sports/ncaa-ban-for-buying-brothers-books