Sat Mar 16 2019
VIRGINIA TECH
AD: Williams not connected to disputed test score
By David Teel

Staff writer


CHUCK BURTON/ASSOCIATED PRESS

Buzz Williams told Yahoo this week that he was unaware of recruiting contact Martin Fox’s involvement in the FBI’s “Operation Varsity Blues.”

Virginia Tech found no link between basketball player Landers Nolley’s disputed standardized test score and a recruiting contact of Hokies coach Buzz Williams charged by the FBI this week in a college admissions bribery case, athletic director Whit Babcock said Friday.

“The process is ongoing,” Babcock said. “(But) we have no reason to believe the two are connected in any way.”


Babcock said he consulted with Williams and Tech’s compliance staff Friday morning. The Hokies lost to Florida State in Thursday’s ACC quarterfinals in Charlotte, N.C.

The centerpiece of Tech’s recruiting class, Nolley, a 6-foot-7 wing from Fairburn, Ga., has not played this season while continuing to practice and receive a scholarship. Tech officials have not acknowledged why Nolley is ineligible, but his high school coach told the Roanoke Times in November that the NCAA questioned Nolley’s score on the ACT entrance exam.

Babcock confirmed that account Friday and said he expects Nolley to play for the Hokies next season.

Yahoo Sports reported Thursday that Martin Fox, charged with conspiracy to commit racketeering in a college admissions scam centered on falsifying standardized test scores, is well-known in college basketball circles. Moreover, Yahoo said Fox sat behind Virginia Tech’s bench during the Hokies’ regular-season finale last Friday at Cassell Coliseum and that his since-deleted Twitter account pictured him in Tech’s locker room after the game.

The FBI accuses Fox, the president of a tennis academy in Houston, of funneling money to arrange for the falsifying of students’ standardized test scores.

Williams told Yahoo on Wednesday that he was unaware of Fox’s involvement in the federal case but said he’s “in the middle of everything” regarding college basketball recruiting. Fox has worked with Houston Hoops, a prominent program on the spring/summer recruiting circuit.

Babcock said Friday that he trusts Williams and that the coach has assured him that his relationship with Fox is benign.

Actresses Felicity Huffman and Lori Loughlin also were among the 50 people charged in the case, dubbed “Operation Varsity Blues” by the FBI.

Fox is due in Boston federal court March 26.

David Teel, 757-247-4636, [email protected]