Georgia football reports three secondary recruiting violations

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Georgia's compliance office reported three secondary recruiting violations to the NCAA in March and April. Those self-reported violations came prior to the dismissal of one recruiting support staffer and the suspension and eventual resignation of another.

According to information obtained by Dawgs247 via an open records request under the Freedom of Information Act, the violations occurred in the months of March and April, prior to the firing of recruiting program coordinator Dacia King in late April and the suspension of Lukman Abdulai, UGA's director of on-campus recruiting. Abdulai was placed on suspension for a month without pay and ultimately resigned his post.

Abdulai had been with the program for six years and helped aid the coaching staff overhaul between Mark Richt and Kirby Smart.

J. Reid Parker Director of Athletics Greg McGarity has elected not to comment when asked about the two staffers, stating that he doesn't discuss personnel matters. Smart has responded similarly when asked.

According to UGA's official website, the program has since hired former Vanderbilt recruiting staff member, as the director of recruiting operations.
No names were mentioned in the documents obtained by 247Sports but one violation was reported on April 29 relating to impermissible entertainment. An "institutional staff member" escorted a student-athlete to the sideline for a couple of minutes during the Bulldogs' G-Day Spring Scrimmage, which is against NCAA rules. That staffer was not allowed to participate in on-campus recruiting activities for 30 days.

A pair of violations were also reported the month prior on March 8. One of those was related to a student worker who escorted a recruit from check-in to his seat and spent five minutes with the prospective student athlete. That resulted in a violation because the student worker isn't allowed to have recruiting duties. The full-time support staffer was reprimanded via a letter for allowing the student worker to host the recruit and said student worker was banned participating in any events where recruits were present and placed in an office role for the remainder of the 2018-2019 school year.
The other March 8 violation was related to a member of the coaching staff providing a video to the parent of a recruit who wasn't able to accompany the student-athlete on the visit. The video was "personalized" per the report, making it a violation.

The violating member of UGA's coaching staff was forbidden to have contact with that recruit for 30 days after the infraction was reported, including text messages, phone calls, and off-campus visits during the spring evaluation period. UGA also took away two spring evaluation days for said staff member.

All three of the violations were tagged with the Level III label, which means they were unintentional, isolated, and didn't provide a major recruiting advantage.