NCAA ousts Eleven programs from postseason play in 2016-2017

Southern University revisits the NCAA probation after 11 months of being released from its stranglehold.
Less than a year of being freed to visit postseason play, 11 athletic programs excluding men’s basketball and women’s tennis faces a postseason ban in 2016-2017 academic year as part of the related sanctions in which the NCAA stated on April 20, 2016.
In addition to the postseason ban set by the NCAA, the teams have been set to have reduced practice times as well.
Southern University has been stricken with three NCAA sanctions since the rising cases of Academic Progress Rates in 2011.
Since 2003, the NCAA to increase graduation retention has evaluated the institutions athletic programs on the students’ grades. Teams that fail to apply these rules and practices will face a various amounts of penalties.
The most rigorous case fell in 2013 after Southern released unusable data that made verifying the APR data impossible and after a year and a half of going over that data, Southern was released last May.
But on April 20, it was found that Southern was lacking data once again in part of the lingering unusable data.
To speak out on such atrocities, interim athletic director and men’s basketball coach, Roman Banks said, “This isn’t unexpected. We’d know some of our programs were in jeopardy and our hope is that we just push through another year of this.”
Southern was unable to apply a fix to all of its unusable data. The data led to lower scores because the data could not be verified by the NCAA. Some athletes transferred because of the postseason ban and since they left before their degree was pursued also put a negative effect on the APR scores.
Banks said that projections are improved from 2015-2016.
Southern faces “Level Three” penalties, the most severe APR penalties imposed by the NCAA, because of the recurrence of the shortcomings.
Level One penalties are in-season limits of five days and 16 hours of participation for athletes, which is designed to allow them more time to spend on academics.
In addition to the Level One penalties, Level Two penalties include out-of-season limitations. The football program has been unable to hold spring practice of the past two years because of previous sanctions, and it will be unable to do so again in 2017.
Along those same lines, the women’s soccer and volleyball teams will be unable to have spring practice, and the softball team will have to give up fall practice. The other sanctioned programs face a 10 percent reduction in games or matches scheduled next season.
Level Three penalties include those from levels one and two as well as the postseason ban.
Southern’s baseball team have been announced to be placed on postseason ban early in the season for falling below the 930 APR score required by the NCAA.
Only three other institutions have been placed under “Level Three” penalties which are Florida A&M, Savannah State, and Alcorn State. Level Three penalties were placed on Alcorn State’s men’s basketball team.
Banks said that he’s confident that the unusable data will no longer be a factor into the four year scores, Southern will be in better shape.
In the past eight months, Banks has hired two new compliance officers and added that the university hired a certified team of deans and instructors are working with the athletic department to ensure adequate documentation of APR scores by students.
Southern has to clear themselves from a huge rut now.