About Enforcement

The NCAA enforcement program strives to maintain a level playing field for the more than 400,000 student-athletes. Commitment to fair play is a bedrock principle of the NCAA. The NCAA upholds that principle by enforcing membership-created rules that ensure equitable competition and protect the well-being of student-athletes at all member institutions.

Death Penalty: The ‘death penalty’
is a phrase used by media to describe the most serious NCAA penalties possible.
It is not a formal NCAA term.  It applies  only to repeat violators and can
include eliminating the involved sport for at least one year, the elimination of
athletics aid in that sport for two years and the school relinquishing its
Association voting privileges for a four-year period.  A school is a repeat
violator if a second major violation occurs within five years of the start date of the penalty from the first case. The cases do not have to be in the same
sport