Associated Press file photo by Danny Karnik / Former Georgia Tech men’s basketball assistant Darryl LaBarrie’s involvement in a recruiting scandal during his time with the Yellow Jackets helped lead to several NCAA sanctions against the program.ATLANTA – Georgia Tech athletic director Todd Stansbury expressed support for men’s basketball coach Josh Pastner after his team was slapped with NCAA sanctions Thursday, including being banned from postseason play for the 2019-20 season.
Pastner’s efforts to rebuild the struggling Atlantic Coast Conference program have been dealt a major blow, though, after the NCAA hit the Yellow Jackets with four years of probation for major recruiting violations committed by Pastner’s former assistant coach and a former friend. The sanctions handed down by the NCAA also included a reduction in scholarships, limits on recruiting and a fine of $5,000 plus 2% of the program’s budget.
Pastner was not directly named in the NCAA’s findings and was largely cleared in Tech’s own investigation.
“We admonish Josh for his poor judgment” in allowing his former friend, Ron Bell, “to get close to the program in the first place,” Stansbury said.
That was the extent of any punishment for Pastner.