{"id":162117,"date":"2026-03-13T03:58:38","date_gmt":"2026-03-13T03:58:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/162117\/"},"modified":"2026-03-13T03:58:38","modified_gmt":"2026-03-13T03:58:38","slug":"steven-pearl-defends-auburn-assistant-after-queens-coach-accusation-of-buying-courtside-seat-to-recruit-players","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/162117\/","title":{"rendered":"Steven Pearl defends Auburn assistant after Queens coach accusation of buying courtside seat to recruit players"},"content":{"rendered":"

Auburn<\/a> head coach Steven Pearl has defended assistant coach Ian Borders after he attended the A-SUN Tournament last week in an attempt to recruit for the Tigers next season. Queens head coach Grant Leonard had called out \u201can SEC assistant<\/a>\u201d earlier in the week trying to \u201cget ahead\u201d on recruiting in the portal for next season.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is a permissible activity,\u201d Pearl told The Athletic.<\/a> However, Leonard claims it\u2019s one thing for a coach to be a live scout from the stands, but it\u2019s another to be on the floor courtside attempting to interact with his players. <\/p>\n

Pearl sent The Athletic<\/a> two bullet points on the matter. Both, Auburn believes, clear Borders and the rest of the program from any wrongdoing. <\/p>\n

\u201cA basketball staff member attending another conference\u2019s basketball tournament would not be prohibited by 11.6 (Scouting of Opponents) since it is unlikely\/impossible to be a future opponent at this time of the season.<\/p>\n

\u201cStaff (who are not permissible off-campus recruiters) may observe\/evaluate only student-athletes NOT in the transfer portal. Which means, if any participating student-athlete has entered the transfer portal (and becomes a PSA), all recruiting legislation applies \u2014 including recruiting periods, counting evaluations, contact restrictions on the day of competition, and permissible recruiters.\u201d<\/p>\n

While Auburn \u2014 one year removed from a Final Four \u2014 is certainly an attractive option for players at that level, Leonard wants a lie drawn in the sand so that his players can\u2019t be distracted before the NCAA transfer portal even opens.<\/p>\n

Other mid-major coaches have chimed in on the issue, including first-year\u00a0USF<\/a>\u00a0head coach\u00a0Bryan Hodgson, a former\u00a0Alabama<\/a>\u00a0assistant coach under\u00a0Nate Oats. He largely echoed Leonard\u2019s sentiment. Still, it appears that there\u2019s nothing stopping any team from scouting in this way, at least for now. <\/p>\n

\u201cIs this the route we\u2019re really trying to go down? Maybe the NCAA was wrong,\u201d Leonard said. \u201cI don\u2019t know if there\u2019s clear parameters on this. But we probably need them. Because otherwise it\u2019s going to go further and further every year. We don\u2019t want to end up being like junior college. <\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s not what we\u2019re trying to do. As coaches, we can police ourselves, and hoping as a group we decide to make decisions that are the best for the sport.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Auburn head coach Steven Pearl has defended assistant coach Ian Borders after he attended the A-SUN Tournament last…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":162118,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[9,24,63,122,124,123,66849],"class_list":["post-162117","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-queens","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","tag-queens","tag-queens-headlines","tag-queens-news","tag-steven-pearl-06-west"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/162117","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=162117"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/162117\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/162118"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=162117"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=162117"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=162117"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}