Texas Tech Red Raiders: Self-imposed NCAA Penalties Approved

Texas Tech Red Raider athletic director Kirby Hocutt said the schools self-imposed penalties from the Billy Gillispie fiasco has been approved from the NCAA.

Outside the crazy “making injured kids practice” accusation against the former Red Raider head coach, the only factual finding was that Gillispie exceeded limits on practice time last fall. When I say exceeded, I mean marathon-like 6 hour sessions.

The NCAA, being such a stand-up arbitrary governing body, notified the school last week that it deemed the practices  “secondary violations”.

Here are a few statements released by Hocutt:

“The NCAA notified the university late last week that it has accepted our self-imposed penalties and has classified this case as secondary,” Hocutt said. “These self-imposed penalties were served in the fall of 2012 with a reduction in practice time over a period of four weeks. The NCAA concluded that because our actions in response to the situation were substantial and meaningful, no further action by the NCAA enforcement staff was necessary. We are looking forward to an exciting season under the leadership of Coach (Chris) Walker.”

The actual self-imposed penalties you ask? Texas Tech took away twice the number of hours per week that Gillispie had exceeded the limit during a two-week period in December.

So why is all the other Gillispie findings (such as false promises, injured players practicing, and bullying summer camp children) not being further investigated or punished?

Maybe they are or maybe they already have been. However, since the NCAA hasn’t commented on these “secondary violations” the college basketball world may never know.

Not that they would even want anyone to know.

Joe covers the Big East and everything “Wild Billy” Gillispie related. Follow Joe on Twitter @JosephNardone