Death Penalty (NCAA) - Southern Methodist University Football, 1986

Southern Methodist University Football, 1986

The SMU case was the first modern "death penalty" - that is, the first one utilized under the "repeat violator" rule. It is the only modern death penalty handed down to a Division I school.

SMU football had already been placed on three years' probation in 1985 for recruiting violations. At the time, it had been on probation seven times (including five times since 1974), more than any other school in Division I-A.

However, in 1986, SMU faced allegations by two whistleblowing players, Sean Stopperich and David Stanley, that players were still being paid. An investigation found that 21 players received approximately $61,000 in cash payments, with the assistance of athletic department staff members, from a slush fund provided by a booster. Payments ranged from $50 to $725 per month, and started only a month after SMU went on its original probation (though it later emerged that a slush fund had been maintained in one form or another since the mid-1970s). Also, SMU officials lied to NCAA officials about when the payments stopped.

While the school had assured the NCAA that players were no longer being paid, the school's board of governors, led by chairman Bill Clements, decided that the school had to honor previous commitments made to the players. However, under a secret plan adopted by the board, the school would phase out the slush once all players that were still being paid had graduated.

As a result:

• The 1987 season was canceled; only conditioning drills (without pads) were permitted until the spring of 1988.
• All home games in 1988 were canceled. SMU was allowed to play their seven regularly scheduled away games so that other institutions would not be financially affected. The university ultimately chose to cancel the away games as well.
• The team's existing probation was extended to 1990. Its existing ban from bowl games and live television was extended to 1989.
• SMU lost 55 new scholarship positions over 4 years.
• The team was allowed to hire only five full-time assistant coaches instead of the typical nine.
• No off-campus recruiting was permitted until August 1988, and no paid visits could be made to campus by potential recruits until the start of the 1988–89 school year.

The infractions committee cited the need to "eliminate a program that was built on a legacy of wrongdoing, deceit and rule violations" as a factor in what is still the harshest penalty ever meted out to any major collegiate program. It also cited SMU's past history of violations and the "great competitive advantage" the Mustangs had gained as a result of cheating. However, it praised SMU for cooperating fully with the investigation, as well as its stated intent to run a clean program. Had SMU not fully cooperated, it would have had its football program shut down until 1989 and would have lost its right to vote at NCAA conventions until 1990.

All recruits and players were allowed to transfer without losing eligibility, and most did. On April 11, 1987, SMU announced its football team would stay shuttered for 1988 as well, citing the near-certainty that it would not have enough experienced players left to field a competitive team. Their concerns proved valid, as new coach Forrest Gregg was left with a severely undersized and underweight roster composed mostly of freshmen.

Before the "death penalty" was instituted, SMU was a storied program in college football, with a Heisman Trophy winner (Doak Walker in 1949), one national championship (from the Dickinson System in 1935) and 10 Southwest Conference titles. The Mustangs compiled a 52–19–1 record from 1980 until 1986, including an undefeated season in 1982 led by the Pony Express backfield of future Pro Football Hall of Fame member Eric Dickerson and Craig James. The only blemish on that team's record was a tie against Arkansas, which denied the Mustangs a shot at the national championship despite being the only undefeated team in the nation.

Afterwards, players were reluctant to attend a school with a history of such major recruiting violations. In addition, the loss of 55 scholarships meant that it would be 1992 before the Mustangs were able to field a team with a full complement of scholarship players; it would be another year before it fielded a team consisting entirely of players unaffected by the scandal.

Since 1989 SMU has defeated only 2 ranked teams, has had only 3 winning seasons, and is 64–158–3. The Mustangs did not return to a bowl game until 2009; they won the 2009 Hawaiʻi Bowl on December 24, 2009 over Nevada by a score of 45–10. The death penalty decimated the Southwest Conference's reputation and finances, contributing to the collapse of the entire conference in 1996 (which led to a major conference realignment). However, Yahoo! Sports writer Dan Wetzel said in 2012 that as harshly as SMU was punished, its post-scandal struggles could not be entirely blamed on the sanction:

The reason it's struggled to find success since then, however, isn't because of that penalty. It's because the school de-emphasized football. The NCAA banned the Mustangs from one season of play. The school added an additional year. Then it applied strict academic requirements to recruits that completely altered the type of athlete it was bringing in. It never got caught up with the competition in terms of building opulent facilities or a massive stadium.

Years later, members of the committee that imposed the "death penalty" said that they had never anticipated a situation where they would ever have to impose it, but their investigation at SMU revealed a program completely out of control. Still, the crippling effects the penalty had on SMU has reportedly made the NCAA reluctant to impose another one. Former University of Florida President John V. Lombardi, now president of the Louisiana State University System, said in 2002: "SMU taught the committee that the death penalty is too much like the nuclear bomb. It's like what happened after we dropped the (atom) bomb in World War II. The results were so catastrophic that now we'll do anything to avoid dropping another one.”

Despite the NCAA's apparent wariness about imposing a death penalty, it has indicated that the SMU case is its standard for imposing such an extreme sanction. For example, in its 2005 investigation of the Baylor University men's basketball team, the NCAA determined that the Bears had committed violations as egregious as those found at SMU 18 years earlier. However, it praised Baylor for taking swift corrective action once the violations came to light, including forcing out head coach Dave Bliss. According to the NCAA, this stood in marked contrast to SMU, where school officials knew violations had occurred and did nothing. The report asserted that

The violations in the present matter are as serious as those committed in the case referenced above . However, in contrast to that case, once the violations finally came to light Baylor University took decisive and meaningful action to stop the violations and to punish itself and the involved individuals, including replacing the entire men's basketball coaching staff, implementing a postseason ban, forfeiting conference tournament revenue and reducing official paid visits, recruiting opportunities and scholarships....The university and several of the involved individuals exhibited genuine remorse and demonstrated total cooperation with the NCAA in developing the facts of this case.