There has been a lot of chatter this week about the Michigan football team receiving a Notice Of Allegations (NOA) from the NCAA for their sign-stealing investigation. While there has been no official NOA issued to the Wolverines, ESPN did obtain a draft of it, and there is a lot of important information in there regarding some potential punishments that Michigan could face.
It was clear that the Michigan football team wasn't at any advantage during their run to the national championship last year as the sign-stealing had come to light. Connor Stalions, who led the sign-stealing scheme, has resigned, and every opponent was aware of what had happened. However, there are people that wonder if the Wolverines built their success on cheating.
The Michigan football team has won three straight Big Ten titles, they have made the College Football Playoff three years in a row and they are the defending national champions. One of the biggest questions surrounding the NOA is whether or not any wins will be vacated. Let's answer that and some other important questions surrounding potential punishments for Michigan.
Will wins be vacated?
Rival fans have talked a lot about the NCAA dropping the hammer on Michigan football and vacating all their wins, including the national championship, from the past three seasons. Is that something that Michigan fans need to worry about? Right now, that seems extremely unlikely. The ESPN article about the draft doesn't say anything about anyone besides Connor Stalions knowingly breaking any NCAA rules. That is good for Michigan.
It seems like the biggest thing that Michigan will get in trouble for is non-compliance. Sherrone Moore deleted 52 text messages between him and Stalions when the news of the sign-stealing scheme dropped, but those messages were eventually recovered by the NCAA. However, Moore could still be facing a Level 2 violation, which leads us into our next question:
Will Sherrone Moore be suspended?
Because of the Level 2 violation, there is a chance that Michigan football head coach Sherrone Moore could be suspended. Is this ideal for the Wolverines? Absolutely not, but it's also not the end of the world. Jim Harbaugh was suspended for half of the regular season last year, and Michigan won the national championship. It's obviously not something that the Wolverines want, but it's not that bad.
Will Michigan face a postseason ban?
There has been a lot of talk about a potential postseason ban for the Michigan football team this week because of a report that came to light, but the ESPN article didn't say anything about it. The only punishment that was mentioned was the potential suspension to Sherrone Moore.
The article stated that there was no evidence that Jim Harbaugh was involved in Stalions' s scheme, which is good news for Wolverines fans. It sounds like the biggest concern is noncompliance issues, but other people besides Stalions knowingly breaking the rules does not appear to be a concern.
Not only did the article mention violations from the sign-stealing investigation, but it also discussed what seem like some minor recruiting violations. Some of these violations include providing a recruit with team gear, paying for a recruit's meal, helping a recruit get verified on Instagram, donating to a gold charity event run by a recruit's father and sending text messages to a recruit that was a high school sophomore. The Wolverines shouldn't be too worried about any of that.
Michigan should receive an official NOA soon, and much more information will come to light then.
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