Penn St. Football Hit with Severe NCAA Sanctions
By: Harold Kuntz
Updated: July 23, 2012
The NCAA imposes a $60 million dollar sanction, a four-year postseason ban and vacates all wins from 1998-2011. Penn State must also reduce 10 initial and 20 total scholarships each year for a four-year period, the release said. In addition, all players are allowed to transfer to another school without having to sit out a year.
The NCAA revealed the sanctions as NCAA president Mark Emmert and Ed Ray, the chairman of the NCAA's executive committee, in Indianapolis at the organization's headquarters. Emmert said, "Football will never again be placed ahead of educating, nurturing and protecting young people."
The NCAA said the $60 million was equivalent to the average annual revenue of the football program.
The Penn State athletic program will also be put on five-year probation and must work with an athletic-integrity monitor of NCAA's chosing.
The NCAA Board of Trustees granted Emmert the authority to punish through the nontraditional methods. The NCAA's announcement comes a day after Penn State removed Joe Paterno's statue outside Beaver Stadium, a decision that came 10 days after former FBI director Louis J. Freeh found that Paterno, with three other top Penn State administrators, had concealed allegations of child sexual abuse made against former defensive coordinator Jerry Sandusky.
Paterno won 409 games for the school in his 46 seasons as head coach. With the new imposed sanctions he has now won 298 games as Head Coach.
