[NU Sports] What's the matter with Stanford basketball?

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Hello Gary !

Harry Kirsch

Stanford recruits visited strip club 
2003 incidents, revealed in lawsuit, didn't violate rules at time






Ron Kroichick and Mark Fainaru-Wada, Chronicle Staff Writers

Wednesday, January 11, 2006


 
 

 
    


    
    


    






Stanford football players entertained recruits by taking them to a San 
Francisco strip club on two weekends in January 2003 -- and the outings were paid 
for with athletic-department money. 

The university acknowledged Tuesday the visits took place, but it said no 
coaches were aware of the trips and the actions did not violate NCAA rules. 
However, the incidents prompted an athletic-department investigation that resulted 
in changes to the policies on recruiting visits. 

The information about the trips to the strip club surfaced in a lawsuit filed 
by an athletic-department employee against the university and senior 
associate athletic director Debra Gore-Mann. Gore-Mann, who oversees the department's 
finances, is a candidate to replace recently departed athletic director Ted 
Leland. 

The suit was brought by Sheryl Kanzaki, who alleges she was harassed and 
discriminated against, particularly by Gore-Mann. 

Gore-Mann did not return a phone message seeking comment. 

The school issued a statement Tuesday stating it "regrets the actions of the 
student athletes who accompanied recruits in 2003 to adult entertainment 
venues." Even though NCAA rules were not violated, the statement said the school's 
"standards of conduct preclude such entertainment as any part of recruitment 
activity." 

Per NCAA rules, each host player receives $30 per day to entertain a recruit. 
The lawsuit alleges the Stanford athletes filed "numerous, handwritten 
'receipts' for $20 each for expenditures" at the New Century Theater, a Larkin 
Street club whose Web site advertises "Lap Dancers," "Video Booths," and "VIP 
Lounges." 

Stanford Senior Counsel Patrick Dunkley acknowledged the "receipts" were 
filed by an administrator in the football department and then flagged by Kanzaki. 
Dunkley also admitted that, as Kanzaki alleged, the handwritten receipts later 
were replaced by lost-receipt memos to account for the money spent at the 
club. 

Dunkley said he didn't know whether player hosts had taken recruits to strip 
clubs before the 2003 incidents. However, the athletic department received 
indications the adult-entertainment excursions weren't uncommon, according to a 
source familiar with the Stanford football program and its investigation of the 
incidents. 

"Everybody on the football team was interviewed," said the source, who 
requested anonymity because of the pending lawsuit. "There were some players who 
said they knew nothing about it. But there were others who said, 'It was a 
tradition, it happened to me when I was recruited.' " 

Buddy Teevens, the school's head football coach at the time, said Tuesday 
that he was not aware of any previous incidents and that he learned of the trips 
to the New Century after the fact. Teevens, now Dartmouth's coach, said he was 
"hazy" about details, but he believed the situation involved "one set of 
receipts from one individual." 

However, according to information provided to The Chronicle, the trips to the 
New Century involved at least 10 player hosts and their recruits, with more 
than $300 spent at the club. Dunkley, the school's counsel, said recruits were 
taken there on two separate weekends in January 2003. 

According to thebootleg.com, a Stanford fans Web site that tracks recruiting, 
the school hosted 28 players on the weekends of Jan. 10-11 and 17-18. Twenty 
of those players ended up at Stanford. 

Teevens said he was "surprised and disappointed" and that "we ripped 
everybody" involved after learning of the strip-club trips. 

"From that point forward, the threat was clear: You would jeopardize your 
scholarship if you were involved in any activities of that sort," Teevens said in 
a phone interview. 

In connection with the recruiting visits, Stanford did report a minor NCAA 
violation -- but not for players visiting the strip club. The university 
informed the Pac-10 in 2003 that players had exceeded the amount they were allowed to 
spend while entertaining a recruit, according to Ron Barker, an assistant 
commissioner for governance and enforcement at the conference office. 

At the time, Barker said, taking a recruit to a strip club was not an NCAA 
violation. In August 2004, after a highly publicized scandal at Colorado in 
which sex and alcohol were used to entice football recruits to attend the school, 
the NCAA board of directors issued guidelines for recruiting visits that it 
expected schools to adopt. 

Those guidelines include not taking recruits to strip clubs. 

Stanford had made similar changes on its own in the wake of the New Century 
incidents, according to Dunkley. Jon Alston, a linebacker who recently 
completed his senior season, said he knew nothing about the strip-club visits but 
recalled the university becoming more diligent about recruiting reimbursements. 

"There was a dramatic shift in how the expenses were done shortly after 
2003," Alston said. "The administration was very strict about what was appropriate 
and what was not appropriate. Every dollar was to be accounted for and 
receipts were always necessary." 

Kanzaki's lawsuit stretches beyond the allegation of recruiting 
improprieties. The suit, filed Nov. 18 in Santa Clara County Superior Court, runs 35 pages 
and offers a detailed chronology of alleged harassment, retaliation and 
discrimination, mostly involving Gore-Mann. 

According to the lawsuit, Kanzaki developed several medical conditions, some 
of which she attributed to the treatment she received from Gore-Mann. 

By March 2005, the lawsuit states, Kanzaki was diagnosed with severe 
depression, a condition she attributes to Gore-Mann changing her responsibilities and 
"retaliating" against Kanzaki for her work limitations and for raising 
questions about reimbursement requests. 

"This is fundamentally a case of disability discrimination and retaliation by 
Gore-Mann in particular and Stanford in general," said David Secrest, 
Kanzaki's lawyer. 

E-mail the writers at rkroichick at sfchronicle.com and 
mfainaru-wada at sfchronicle.com. 

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