College basketball’s 30 biggest cheaters that tainted the game

8. Bruce Pearl

There are plenty of coaches who have done questionable things on this list, and Bruce Pearl certainly fits the bill. Pearl’s questionable tactics date back to his days as an assistant at Iowa, when he engaged in some shady recruiting practices.

Iowa and Illinois were in pursuit of the same recruit, forward Deon Thomas, who had committed to the Illini. Pearl ended up calling Thomas and recorded a conversation where he got the recruit to say he was offered cash and a car by an Illinois assistant, leading to an NCAA investigation of the Wolverines.

The incident made Pearl persona non-grata in Division I circles for years, and he ended up finally getting a head coaching job in 2001 at UW-Milwaukee. Pearl’s success there launched him into the Tennessee job, where he frequently had the Volunteers in SEC contention.

Things started to unravel for Pearl at Tennessee in 2008 when he invited recruit Aaron Craft and his family to a barbecue at his house during an unofficial visit. Pearl knew Craft wasn’t allowed to be there, but encouraged everyone in attendance to lie about it, a major no-no with the NCAA.

The allegations eventually came out, and Pearl was penalized by Tennessee, which eventually fired him after more rules violations were uncovered. Pearl was also given a three-year show-cause penalty by the NCAA, which didn’t deter Auburn from hiring him in 2014.