I've written a lot lately about the allegations that a low-level staffer with the Michigan Wolverines football team had the task of stealing the signals of rival teams in order to gain an advantage against them. We initially learned that the original allegations were that Wolverines staffer Connor Stalions spied on Big Ten teams, but the circle of teams that he reportedly sought to spy on continues to grow.
Over the weekend, a former Division III coach came forward saying that Stalions paid him to spy on Michigan's opponents. The anonymous coach told ESPN that Stalions offered him money to video the signals from teams that played against the Wolverines.
The man, a former Division III football player and coach, spoke to ESPN on the condition that his name not be published because he was concerned about his privacy. He is the first person who was involved in the alleged cheating scheme to publicly share details about their role.
He said he attended three Big Ten games during the past two years to record the sideline of a future Michigan opponent. He said he uploaded the videos he took on his personal cellphone to a shared iPhone photo album but does not know who else other than Stalions had access to the album.
The former coach admitted that he was wary of Stalions, but he also said that he assumed that if someone from a program like Michigan was asking him to do it, the video spying must have fallen in a "gray area" of NCAA regulations. He also said that Stalions paid him "a couple hundred dollars" to help spy.
Related: Top College Football Program Faces Cheating Allegations
Sports Illustrated is also reporting that Michigan allegedly even tried to use the ball boys to help spy. It makes sense in a way because ball boys can easily see what's going on on the opponents' sidelines.
"Multiple sources from one Big Ten school told SI that a coach at a different school called them before playing Michigan to warn them about Wolverines ball boys on their sideline listening to play calls and communicating information to the Michigan sideline—holding the football up in one hand to indicate an expected pass, and in the other hand to indicate a run, for instance, SI reports. "Sources at the school that was warned said they experienced nothing in the game to implicate the Michigan ball boys."
Both ESPN and SI note that Michigan won't comment on the new wrinkles in this ever-changing story because of the ongoing investigations. But SI points out that the College Football Playoff (CFP) Committee, which released its first rankings on Tuesday (Halloween night — spooky!), has a "maize-and-blue hot potato" on its hands with a top contender facing hefty allegations:
One said that the situation is unprecedented and there is nothing that he knew of within the CFP bylaws for appraising a team under investigation differently than the rest of the teams. A second said he anticipates that CFP executive director Bill Hancock will instruct the committee to judge Michigan on its on-field merits only. A third said he thinks the controversy could come into play as “a tiebreaker” if the committee is trying to decide between No. 1 and No. 2, or—perhaps more controversially—No. 4 and No. 5.
There's still a lot that we're learning about this situation, which seems to be changing every day. But one thing is for sure: Michigan is going to have to answer plenty of questions eventually.
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