1973 with my formal resignation effective at the end of the month. I left before Long Beach received an NCAA official inquiry into the althetic program, both football and basketball. If I had realized an official inquiry was coming, I can assure you I would not have resigned my position there. I feel quite strongly that by staying I would have been better able to protect myself, and I think the future developments show this.

In May of 1973 I received a call from Long Beach officials. They wanted me to return to the school to answer some questions from the NCAA. I answered those questions as truthfully as I could and told the Long Beach officials that if there was any need for additional answers, or if any additional proof to support my replies was needed to please let me know and I would be glad to meet personally with them or the NCAA at my own expense. That was the last time, however, I heard from the Long Beach State officials. I was never interviewed or questioned by the NCAA enforcement staff except to authorize them to review some travel agency records.

On January 7, 1974, the news was splashed in papers throughout the country that Long Beach State had been placed on probation. I had never been told that any of my replies were not accepted, had never been given the opportunity to provide evidence to support my statements, to prove my innocence, had never been informed as to my accusers and had never been given the opportunity to personally defend myself.

I was stunned. Newspapers called me and I couldn't answer their questions because I didn't know what they were talking about. Finally, a UPI correspondent in San Francisco sent me a copy of the NCAA press release and I could sort out some information from that. The effect of this negative publicity on such a wide scale was devastating to me and to every member of my family.

In April of 1974 I requested through a lawyer that I receive an NCAA hearing concerning the charges of which they found me guilty without my knowing about it. My lawyer told me he was informed by the NCAA that I could only receive such a hearing at the request of Long Beach State and only if new evidence were available. How could I determine what would be considered new evidence when I didn't even know on what basis the charges had been made in the first place and wasn't even sure which charges I supposedly was guilty of?

The NCAA stated that it was the responsibility of the school, not theirs, to have had me present at the hearing. Yet, in the recent UNLV case, NCAA officials made a direct point of stating that a former assistant coach was not invited to the hearings.

Whether Long Beach could have invited me to the hearings or whether the NCAA would have allowed it, I can only guess. I only know I was shamed in the press, called a cheater by fans at games, and saw my own family stagger under the assault. I would try to explain to people and they would listen kindly and considerately, but it was obvious they didn't believe me, even some of my friends.

Even before Long Beach went on probation, I had begun to hear about statements supposedly made about me, Long Beach, and UNLV by NCCA investigators. Roscoe Poindexter, a Long Beach student, and Jackie Robinson, a student I had recruited for UNLV, and Jackie's

mother reported these things to me soon after I arrived at UNLV. Each of them signed statements setting forth their recollection of their interviews with NCAA investigators and I believe the subcommittee has copies of those statements. According to those statements, the investigators implied very derogatory comments about me and strongly inferred that both Long Beach and UNLV would be going on probation for considerable periods of time.

If these reports were true, it seems to me the highly proclaimed confidentiality issue of the NCAA was thrown out the window. In addition, it certainly does not seem fair and just if two schools were being talked about being guilty of violations and going on probation when in fact one school had just received the official inquiry and had not had a hearing and the second school was not to receive a notice of an official inquiry until almost 3 years later.

As more and more information came to us, we became more and more concerned. I tried to work internally within the NCAA system. Even though I had considered going to court after the Long Beach occurrence, I believed in the NCAA and I wanted to work within its framework.

If there was a problem, if I was misinterpreting rules, if somehow there were violations unknown to me, I wanted to know about it in order to correct them. I knew I had been hired to revitalize the university's basketball program. I did not want this chance destroyed before it started.

I spoke with David Berst on a number of occasions. He had always acted nice to me to my face. I told him I felt there must be misunderstandings. He told me that if there was a problem at UNLV he would get back to me.

I informed Dr. Zorn, the president of UNLV, by letter in May of 1973 of what the Robinsons had said, hoping that he would take it up with the NCAA.

Exactly a month later, the acting president, Dr. Baepler, wrote to Warren Brown, assistant executive director of the NCAA, protesting the NCAA investigator's interview with Jackie Robinson and informing Mr. Brown that the university's entire athletic program as well as the university's booster's club were totally reorganized and that the university had hoped to live up to both the letter and the intent of NCAA and conference regulations. It seems to me that if at this time the NCAA had information which led them to believe that there were problems at Las Vegas, then in fairness, and in the spirit of cooperation, Dr. Baepler should have been told of the problems and what could be done to correct them. As I understand it, this did not happen. As more information along these lines accumulated, I went to our athletic director and asked him what I should do. He flew to Kansas City personally to speak with Warren Brown and Walter Byers and convey our concern. The response was a letter from Mr. Byers basically defending all of the NCAA's actions and indicating I might be bringing up these matters for some reason of my own.

In desperation and on my own, I wrote a 16-page letter in early December 1975 to Dr. John Fuzak, then president of the NCAA, detailing what I felt was happening. I probably was rather emotional in the letter, but I was certainly feeling emotional.

As we heard more and more information about the actions of NCAA investigators, my wife became more and more convinced something was terribly wrong and no matter what, the investigators must be heavily prejudiced against me or they would not be saying the things they were saying. The effect upon her was shattering and the resultant effect upon my children was serious. She was convinced I was being framed. I still felt that maybe one or two investigators might be trying to harm me, but I would be able to clear myself once the thing came to a head and I could match up with facts rather than rumors and innuendos.

I spoke with Dr. Fuzak and he assured me that even if something went against a person with the infractions committee, the council, of which he was president at the time, would not make a decision against anyone unless the charge was backed by evidence. That relieved me, as I felt, how could you be framed if the accusers need evidence?

Finally, the official inquiry came to UNLV at the end of February 1976, almost 3 years after we first heard about what was told to Jackie Robinson. I read over the allegations and thought some of them were quite ridiculous. Indeed, I was relieved. Finally I would have the opportunity to end all the rumors and correct the record. I did everything within my power to fully cooperate with the investigation and with everything the NCAA requested.

The NCAA asked for almost 3 years of my personal telephone records, as well as all records of calls made from my office, from a credit card, and so forth. The request for personal telephone records bothered us. We felt quite strongly that this was an invasion of my privacy, my wife's and each of our four children as well. In addition, my wife was working on a graduate thesis concerning the NCAA enforcement staff and she did not care to turn over our records of calls regarding that. Knowing and fearing the consequences if we did not fully comply, however, we both decided to turn over all our records. In addition, the NCAA requested personal information pertaining to the money I was earning, not only my coaching position at UNLV, but other positions as well. They also inquired into the purchase of my home. Again, this was distasteful to us as American citizens, but we feared the consequences if we did not comply.

To my knowledge, there was not a single piece of information requested by the NCAA that they were not able to obtain through us or through the university lawyers.

I tried to do everything right and realized, when it was all over, that it did not matter at all. The entire procedure was the most frustrating, disillusioning experience I have ever had in my entire life. We were not told the sources of the allegations made against us until the hearing so we could not, of course, be fully prepared to disprove any information the investigators might present that was inaccurate.

I began thinking I was with Alice in Wonderland. It was the enforcement staff who had reportedly been involved in all those negative things said about me and they apparently wrote the expanded confidential report for the infractions committee. How is that fair?

I am sure the lawyers can explain better than I the use of selective information during the hearings, the fact that the only documentation. of inaccurate or untrue statements concerned information from the

investigative staff, and so on. Even when all the documentary evidence, including sworn statements submitted by the university supported my innocence, the NCAA chose to believe what the NCAA investigators said somebody else had told them. The whole thing was unbelievable, but the committee on infractions and the NCAA Council evidently were convinced that I and a number of other people were not telling the truth. It seems to me that a sworn statement has greater value than someone's recollection of what someone else said.

I am not saying the infractions committee people are bad people. I just feel that they were going to believe their investigators no matter what. They believe what they were told by the investigators and when it came to a point of where we challenged the credibility of the investigator, we were not to be believed.

I made every attempt to be as careful as possible concerning the NCAA rules at UNLV and even this seemed to be turned around against me. For example, in Las Vegas, numerous hotels and others operate charter flights providing free airline transportation to and from Las Vegas. These are known as "junket flights" and are a "fact of life" in Vegas. When informed that these were available, I told one operator of junket flights that they could not be provided to athletes without violating NCAA rules unless the flights were made available to "other students."

At the UNLV appeal, Bill Hunt argued that I was guilty and told the council that I should have used the words "all students" in the letter to the junket operator to comply with the rule, not the words "other students." I looked up the word "other" in the dictionary. One of its definitions is "all the rest," so I think if I told him that junkets had to be available to "other students" than just athletes, I was complying with the rule of being available to all students, and that is what I meant.

The worst charge found against me was the allegation that I arranged for a professor to guarantee an athlete a grade in a course without the athlete even attending the course. I believe this is a greater violation than money because the athlete is being cheated out of an education. But this never happened. I denied it and there were submitted sworn affidavits from the professor, from the student athlete, and others that denied the charge and stated that the athlete attended the class and did all the required work. There was even a polygraph taken by the professor that denied the charge.

The NCAA also claims that I improperly contacted principals during the university's investigation of the NCAA charges and attempted to cause them to give false information to the university. This is simply untrue. It is true that I participated in the university's investigation, contacted people or had others contact people that I believed to have evidence that would be useful in the investigation, and encouraged them to speak with the university investigators and the attorney general's office.

I do not apologize for this. You must remember that I had made the same offer of help to Long Beach officials when they were investigating the official inquiry from the NCAA. In that case, I heard nothing further until I read in the newspaper that Long Beach was placed on probation and that somehow I was a terrible cheat, guilty of "most serious" infractions of NCAA rules.

That experience, combined with the reports I had been hearing for 3 years while at Las Vegas, some of which I have described today, convinced me that I should not roll over and play dead. This time, I wanted to be sure that the university had all the facts.

I am not saying I am a perfect human being. As I said earlier, and as others have told this committee, I feel almost every coach in the country has probably committed some infractions at one time or another because of the way the rules are written. If they didn't, they would have to have some cold hearts and I don't think many of them would be in coaching if that were the case. We are human. Again, I am not talking about buying athletes or professionalism. I am talking about common decency to a fellow human.

I just don't think I deserved what I got out of all this. I know what has been done to my reputation by the NCAA press releases will never be repaired. I am a marked person reputation-wise, and I have to live with that, but the frustration of it all still bothers me tremendously. How can I be found guilty of these charges if there is no evidence to support the guilt? I am not talking about just an investigator remembering a conversation he had. Memories can be vulnerable, they can be faulty, they can be prejudiced and could omit some of the facts.

Coaches are vulnerable, too. We work with young men at an extremely impressionable age, men who often have their entire ego wrapped up into playing the game. A great high school player finds in college he no longer can keep up the pace and the adulation he took for granted as part of his life is no longer there. He becomes frustrated and bitter. He speaks out emotionally. He can want to hurt and the person most likely to be hurt is the coach because he is in charge of it all and decides who plays, when they play, and who doesn't.

There should be more to back up the NCAA investigator's recollection, something more concrete. I think coaches know what I am talking about. It may be true also for Congressmen who can't meet all the needs of everyone at home all the time and end up with bitterness thrown back at them.

Aside from the coach, however, what happens to the players who are innocent? What about the group of UNLV men who went to Atlanta for the finals of the NCAA basketball championship after working their hearts out all year and were met not with the pleasure of deserved recognition in Georgia, but with continual questions and press comments about the impending probation that somehow leaked to the press?

What can I tell these players? I don't even understand it myself. What can I tell my family, my friends? I suppose all of this will never really end. After the Nevada State court held that I could not be fired by UNLV as the NCAA wanted, a member of the infractions committee was quoted as stating to the press in North Carolina that the NCAA had not been invited to join with the university in fighting the suit, that the judge was up for reelection, and was, therefore, I guess, afraid to hold against me, and the reporter who covered the trial for Sports Illustrated was a good friend of mine who had given something like a testimonial for me during the investigation.

Each of these statements is not true. The university tried to get the NCAA to join the suit but the NCAA declined the invitation. It is over