As most of you probably know, the NCAA held a hearing last Friday in Seattle to discuss the fate of Michigan as it relates to the excessive practice time fiasco earlier this year. The news out of Seattle amounts to...not much at this time. Here is the official statement made by Michigan AD David Brandon:
We feel that the committee gave us a full and fair hearing today. Our statements today were similar to those we provided the NCAA earlier this summer: We own the mistakes we have made, we fixed some process and communication problems that caused them, and we’re keeping a close eye on this so it doesn’t happen again.
I’m proud of the extra effort everyone has been putting into compliance these past several months. Rich and his staff – in coordination with the compliance group – have been working together to keep us on the right track.
We will await the committee’s decision and we will not speculate about the outcome – we must let the process play out. We won’t comment further on this matter until after we receive the committee’s decision.
We’re going to get back to Michigan now for the start of what we expect will be a great football season.
Everyone involved, including former grad assistant Alex Herron, Mike Barwis, and Jim Delany, was present for the hearings, which took around 7 hours to complete. The NCAA will render their decision - be it to uphold the UM self-imposed penalties, or impose new ones - in 6-8 weeks. However, as the NCAA is wont to do, this could take longer - see USC. Along with the 12 boxes of documents presented at the hearing, AD Dave Brandon bought boxes of pizza (Domino's, natch) for all members of the media.
Rodriguez's only comment was that he is glad to have this part of the process behind him. There was no comment from Coleman.
More to follow if details surface, but nothing so far resembling fireworks out of Seattle.