![\"Queens](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/IMG_QUEENS_NFLA_02_2_1_4JQDDPBG_L891472047.JPG\" "\\"Queens")
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Queens basketball coach Grant Leonard led his team to its first NCAA Tournament berth this season.<\/p>\n
JEFF SINER<\/p>\n
jsiner@charlotteobserver.com<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.<\/p>\n <\/a><\/p>\n Read our AI Policy.<\/a><\/p>\n Queens coach Grant Leonard says SEC assistant sat courtside at ASUN game to recruit.Leonard would not name the SEC school, but Charlotte Observer has confirmed it was Auburn.Leonard, whose team has qualified for NCAA tourney, says he\u2019ll raise issue at Final Four.<\/p>\n Queens basketball coach Grant Leonard said Wednesday he was \u201cextremely frustrated\u201d that an assistant coach from an SEC school sat courtside during a Queens game at the Atlantic Sun tournament, so the coach could apparently get a head start on recruiting a player from the current Queens basketball team.<\/p>\n Leonard said he wouldn\u2019t name the player nor the SEC team involved. But The Charlotte Observer has independently confirmed through a source that the school in question was Auburn, and that the coach was Auburn assistant Ian Borders.<\/p>\n Auburn, however, said Wednesday night through a spokesman that an assistant coach going to another conference\u2019s basketball tournament was a \u201cpermissible activity.\u201d<\/p>\n While Leonard didn\u2019t want to talk about the specific school, coach or player \u2014 \u201cI\u2019m just not doing that,\u201d he said \u2014 or specifically ever use the word \u201ctampering,\u201d he did go into detail about the situation in a phone interview with The Observer on Wednesday.<\/p>\n \u201cIn our coaching fraternity, it\u2019s almost like the bar association,\u201d said Leonard, whose Queens team qualified for its first NCAA Division I tournament on Sunday<\/a> by upsetting Central Arkansas in overtime in the ASUN final in Jacksonville, Florida. \u201cWe have to police ourselves. And this is a road I don\u2019t think we as coaches want to go down.<\/p>\n \u201cNow I support the transfer portal, and I support our players getting life-changing money,\u201d Leonard continued. \u201cI\u2019ve helped several of my players do exactly that. But this player isn\u2019t in the portal right now, and this sort of thing is basically trying to coax them to enter it. I will definitely be bringing this up at the NABC convention at the Final Four.\u201d<\/p>\n A Louisville-based journalist named Mike Rutherford first reported on X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter, that the assistant coach in question was Borders. A source later confirmed to The Observer that Borders was indeed the Auburn assistant who attended parts of the ASUN tournament, including the Queens game.<\/p>\n Auburn athletics spokesman Kirk Sampson responded to Observer questions about the incident Wednesday night by saying via email \u201cit is a permissible activity\u201d and noting a memo sent to Power Four schools on February 27 read in part: \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.\u201d<\/p>\n Added Sampson about this memo that Auburn believed gave it the right to attend other conference\u2019s tournaments: \u201cMy understanding (was) it came from the NCAA, who shared with conferences and then on down to the institutions.\u201d<\/p>\n Whether Leonard or Auburn is right is unclear. Leonard said his original social media post about the matter on Wednesday, which went viral, caused the NCAA to call him later that day.<\/p>\n \u201cI didn\u2019t mean to cause all of this,\u201d Leonard said. \u201cBut I was extremely frustrated.\u201d<\/p>\n The original post from Leonard read: \u201cWe had an SEC assistant buy a courtside seat for one of our conference tournament games to \u2018get ahead\u2019 of recruiting on (sic) of my kids.\u201d<\/p>\n Leonard said the person he talked to at the NCAA told him that such an action would not have NCAA approval, although Auburn disagreed with that assessment.<\/p>\n \u201cIf we\u2019re in a tournament, you\u2019re allowed to live-scout your next opponent,\u201d Leonard said. \u201cBut there were no SEC schools in our conference tournament, obviously, and scouting is different than recruiting.\u201d<\/p>\n Leonard said the game in question was not the ASUN final, but Queens\u2019 quarterfinal matchup against West Georgia on Friday. He said his player and the SEC assistant coach had a brief courtside interaction before the game, although it was little more than saying hello.<\/p>\n Leonard added that the SEC assistant coach also attended another game that day and sat courtside, apparently because he was interested in at least one other player on a separate ASUN team as well.<\/p>\n Queens did play Auburn this season, in December, losing 106-65. Auburn (17-15) has had a disappointing season under first-year coach Steven Pearl. The Tigers are seeded 12th in the SEC basketball tournament, but did win their first-round SEC Tournament game Wednesday afternoon against Mississippi State.<\/p>\n Leonard said he didn\u2019t publicly mention the incident when it happened, and thought about just not saying anything at all.<\/p>\n But the Queens coach said he was inspired by a comment this week by South Florida head basketball coach Bryan Hodgson, who told \u201cThe Field of 68\u201d about other assistant coaches potentially recruiting his players while the season was still going on: \u201cAny of these clowns that think they\u2019re gonna reach out to my guys before the season ends and start sending DMs. … I will find you. … We will have a face-to-face conversation.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThat brought some clarity to me,\u201d Leonard said. \u201cSo I quote-tweeted his tweet and basically said, \u2018This is happening.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n A number of college coaches have now made allegations related to the transfer portal more public. Clemson coach Dabo Swinney is the foremost among them, as he recently accused Ole Miss of tampering with a player, laying out his allegation in extraordinary detail.<\/a> Clemson reported Ole Miss to the NCAA.<\/p>\n Queens will have a selection party on its campus Sunday, and CBS cameras plan to be there. The Royals have been celebrating their biggest basketball moment in the sun all week. Queens-related social media accounts have garnered more than one billion impressions since Sunday, Leonard said.<\/p>\n But when it\u2019s all over, the coach knows he\u2019s going to lose some players off this team, because good teams at the lower levels of college basketball always do. The bigger schools simply have more money to pay players.<\/p>\n \u201cAnd I will help them with their recruitment,\u201d Leonard said of his soon-to-be ex-players. \u201cI\u2019ll make calls for them. I want them to get life-changing money.\u201d<\/p>\n Leonard said the most money that any Queens player has been guaranteed by transferring to another school is approximately $500,000. Queens has a small NIL collective that Leonard and his staff control, but he can\u2019t compete with numbers like that. Leonard said he\u2019s fine with players transferring. He\u2019s fine with his players being recruited elsewhere by bigger schools.<\/p>\n \u201cBut what I\u2019m not fine with,\u201d Leonard said, \u201cis an SEC coach sitting courtside at our conference tournament.\u201d<\/p>\n This story was originally published March 11, 2026 at 6:52 PM.<\/p>\n Scott Fowler<\/a><\/p>\n The Charlotte Observer<\/p>\n Columnist Scott Fowler has written for The Charlotte Observer since 1994 and has earned 26 APSE awards for his sportswriting. He hosted The Observer\u2019s podcast \u201cCarruth,\u201d which Sports Illustrated once named \u201cPodcast of the Year.\u201d Fowler also conceived and hosted the online series and podcast \u201cSports Legends of the Carolinas,\u201d which featured 1-on-1 interviews with NC and SC sports icons and was turned into a book. He occasionally writes about non-sports subjects, such as the 5-part series \u201c9\/11\/74,\u201d which chronicled the forgotten plane crash of Eastern Air Lines Flight 212 in Charlotte on Sept. 11, 1974. Queens head coach Grant Leonard celebrates after the Royals won the Atlantic Sun championship on Sunday in Jacksonville, Florida. The win over Central Arkansas gave Queens its first berth in the NCAA Tournament. Todd Drexler Courtesy of Atlantic Sun conference <\/p>\n
Queens celebrates punching its ticket to the NCAA men\u2019s basketball tournament and March Madness on Sunday. Todd Drexler Courtesy of Atlantic Sun conference <\/p>\n
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