Ole Miss Admits Former Assistant Football Coach Helped Falsify ACT Scores

The University of Mississippi has imposed on itself scholarship reductions in football on top of serving a postseason ban for women’s basketball in response to a range of alleged NCAA violations, according to a university statement released on Friday.

In January the National Collegiate Athletic Association issued several allegations against Ole Miss, including boosters’ paying players and coaches’ assisting recruits with ACT fraud.

In the document released on Friday, university administrators admitted that a former assistant football coach, David Saunders, falsified ACT scores for three prospective athletes in the summer of 2010.

Ole Miss said it accepted responsibility for the violations and would fire four coaches, dissociate with boosters involved in the wrongdoing, impose a postseason ban in women’s basketball, reduce football scholarships, cut off-campus evaluations and visits for football and track and field, and pay a $159,325 financial penalty.