Adidas executive James Gatto was among three men found guilty in a US court on Wednesday of conspiring to make illegal payments aimed at recruiting promising players to universities affiliated with the sportswear giant.
Gatto, the company’s director of global sports marketing for basketball, and former Adidas consultant Merl Code were convicted along with sports agent Christian Dawkins on charges of wire fraud and conspiracy to commit wire fraud in connection with a scheme to funnel US$100,000 to the family of former University of Louisville player Brian Bowen.
In similar schemes, money was funneled from Adidas to promising players who ended up at the University of Kansas and North Carolina State University — both sponsored by the company.
“Today’s convictions expose an underground culture of illicit payments, deception and corruption in the world of college basketball,” prosecutor Robert Khuzami said.
“These defendants now stand convicted of not simply flouting the rules, but breaking the law for their own personal gain,” he added. “As a jury has now found, the defendants not only deceived universities into issuing scholarships under false pretenses, they deprived the universities of their economic rights and tarnished an ideal which makes college sports a beloved tradition by so many fans all over the world.”
Evidence in the trial included text messages between the defendants and coaches from high-profile university basketball programs that feed players to the NBA.
Bowen’s father testified that a University of Louisville assistant coach once gave him an envelope full of cash.
The defendants pleaded not guilty, but did not deny they sought to make the payments.
They argued that it was standard practice by apparel manufacturers, who stood to form lucrative associations with the players once they made it to the NBA.
The National Collegiate Athletic Association forbids monetary inducements to players.
The trio are scheduled to be sentenced on March 5 next year, although Gatto’s attorney, Michael Schachter, said he would appeal.
Adidas issued a statement saying it remains committed to ethical business practices.
The case was just one resulting from a massive FBI investigation that exposed the “dark underbelly of college basketball,” federal prosecutors said.
Four coaches associated with top universities sponsored by Nike and Under Armour were also named in indictments earlier this year.
Former Auburn University assistant coach Chuck Person and financial adviser Rashan Michel are to be tried in February.
Tony Bland, Brook Richardson and Lamont Evans, all former assistant coaches at different universities, are scheduled to go on trial in April.
Shohei Ohtani and Clayton Kershaw on Friday joined their Los Angeles Dodgers teammates in sticking their fists out to show off their glittering World Series rings at a ceremony. “There’s just a lot of excitement, probably more than I can ever recall with the Dodger fan base and our players,” manager Dave Roberts said before Los Angeles rallied to beat the Detroit Tigers 8-5 in 10 innings. “What a way to cap off the first two days of celebrations,” Roberts said afterward. “By far the best opening week I’ve ever experienced. I just couldn’t have scripted it any better.” A choir in the
The famously raucous Hong Kong Sevens are to start today in a big test for a shiny new stadium at the heart of a major US$3.85 billion sports park in the territory. Officials are keeping their fingers crossed that the premier event in Hong Kong’s sporting and social calendar goes off without a hitch at the 50,000-seat Kai Tak Stadium. They hope to entice major European soccer teams to visit in the next few months, with reports in December last year saying that Liverpool were in talks about a pre-season tour. Coldplay are to perform there next month, all part of Hong Kong’s
After fleeing Sudan when civil war erupted, Al-Hilal captain Mohamed Abdelrahman and his teammates have defied the odds to reach the CAF Champions League quarter-finals. They are today to face title-holders Al-Ahly of Egypt in Cairo, with the return match in the Mauritanian capital, Nouakchott, on Tuesday next week. Al-Hilal and biggest domestic rivals Al-Merrikh relocated to Mauritania after a power struggle broke out in April 2023 between the Sudanese army and a paramilitary force. The civil war has claimed tens of thousands of lives and displaced more than 12 million people, according to the UN. The Democratic Republic of the Congo-born Al-Hilal
Shohei Ohtani, Teoscar Hernandez and Tommy Edman on Thursday smashed home runs to give the reigning World Series champions the Los Angeles Dodgers a 5-4 victory over Detroit on the MLB’s opening day in the US. The Dodgers, who won two season-opening games in Tokyo last week, raised their championship banner on a day when 28 clubs launched the season in the US. Dodgers manager Dave Roberts shuffled his batting lineup with all four leadoff hitters finally healthy as Ohtani was followed by Mookie Betts, then Hernandez and Freddie Freeman in the cleanup spot, switching places with Hernandez. “There’s a Teoscar tax to