Louisville’s NCAA infractions case for violations when Rick Pitino was coach to be handled by IARP

Louisville’s NCAA infractions case will be resolved through the Independent Accountability Resolution Process, the NCAA announced Friday, as the Cardinals continue to wait for a resolution following allegations that their basketball program violated NCAA rules. Louisville’s case joins a long list of programs that includes NC State, Kansas and Memphis, among others, whose cases will be decided by the relatively new panel.

The IARP, created in 2019 in response to recommendations from the Commission on College Basketball following the FBI’s investigation into bribery and corruption in the sport, aims to minimize perceived conflicts of interest in the adjudication of complicated cases. To date, however, the IARP has not actually issued a ruling on any case that it’s taken.

The slow timeline for the resolution of several pending NCAA infractions cases — many of them in college basketball — has become a source of frustration for college athletics leaders, including the NCAA’s head of enforcement. That Louisville’s case is just now arriving on the IARP’s docket is likely a signal that the Cardinals have a long wait ahead before learning their fate.

In question are allegations that the Cardinals committed a Level I violations and three Level II violations under Rick Pitino. In its response to the NCAA, the Cardinals have argued that the violations should be classified as Level II-mitigated. Pitino is now the coach at Iowa, and the Cardinals are in their third season under coach Chris Mack and have not been coached by Pitino since the 2016-17 season.