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TWO OLD FOES came back to tangle with the National Collegiate Athletic Association's top judicial board last month, and both were sent away with minor penalties and stern warnings.
The Division I Committee on Infractions issued the decisions in cases involving the University of Nevada at Las Vegas and Southern Methodist University, both of which committed major infractions during the 1980's and early 1990's.
The recent sanctions against the Nevada-Las Vegas men's basketball team were relatively light, but the university imposed a startling additional penalty on itself. Hours after the N.C.A.A.'s announcement, university officials fired the team's coach, Bill Bayno, seven games into the 2000-1 season.
The penalties stemmed from violations surrounding the recruitment of Lamar Odom, a star player who signed with U.N.L.V. in 1996 but reneged on his agreement. He played one season for the University of Rhode Island before turning professional.
According to the infractions committee, a U.N.L.V. booster paid Mr. Odom $5,600 in cash and gave him clothes, the use of an apartment, and other benefits while he was being recruited and after he agreed to attend the university.
THE ROLE OF A BOOSTER
The Runnin' Rebels will not be eligible for postseason play this spring and will lose four scholarships over the next two years as penalties for the violations. The Mountain West Conference, to which U.N.L.V. belongs, also barred the team from the conference's postseason championship tournament, even though it will take place at U.N.L.V.'s Thomas & Mack Center.
The N.C.A.A. committee found that the university had failed to monitor the situation closely enough, according to its chairman, Jack H. Friedenthal, a law professor at George Washington University.
"There was a close relationship between prospective student-athletes and boosters," Mr. Friedenthal...