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Colorado self-reported an NCAA recruiting violation after the name of Julian “JuJu” Lewis was mentioned on the school’s weekly coaching show with head coach Deion Sanders in November, according to Brent Schrotenboer of USA Today, prior to Lewis signing with the Buffs in December
Per that report, Colorado “decided to stop livestreaming its weekly coaches show with Sanders and also removed two episodes of the show from YouTube last fall.”
Coaches are not permitted to publicize recruits before those players are signed at the school, though it is considered a minor offense unless it is deemed an ongoing pattern. At the time Lewis was mentioned on the program, he had committed but was not yet eligible to officially sign, making it a violation.
After Lewis’ commitment in November, host Mark Johnson alluded to the news but didn’t mention the player by name while asking Sanders how he approaches communicating with recruits and their families.
“Hey, get JuJu on the phone and get his pop on the phone,” Sanders replied as an example. “See if his dad want to come down and just sit down and chop it up with me. [His father] sat in my office I think a few weeks ago for a couple hours. I said, ‘C,mon, give it all to me because I know you’ve got a bunch of questions on your mind. Let’s go.’ And we did that. And he walked away feeling really comfortable about where we’re headed.”
In the second incident, a second host mentioned Lewis by name, though Sanders did not. Both episodes were removed from YouTube.
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