At the time, Hugh Freeze thought he was standing up for his program. A proud father of a brand-new, near-perfect recruiting class back in 2013, Freeze was offended by all the ruthless cheating accusations hurled at him and his Ole Miss program.
So he did what any reactionary parent would do when he felt his family was threatened -- he lashed out. He went on the offensive, sending out a tweet directing anyone and everyone who felt he and his staff cheated their way to signing the nation's No. 5 recruiting class to email Ole Miss' compliance office with their grievances and evidence.
Freeze's since-deleted tweet infamously read: "If you have facts about a violation, email compliance@olemiss.edu. If not, please don't slander the young men."
That tweet, whether Freeze knew it at the time or not, will define his Ole Miss coaching career. That tweet, which Freeze felt was in good faith, now serves as an embarrassment after the school announced Wednesday it was self-imposing a one-year bowl ban for the 2017 season for major recruiting violations. The university received a new NCAA notice of allegations (NOA) that accused the school of lack of institutional control and that Freeze failed to monitor his coaching staff.
The amended NOA alleges eight new rules violations to go along with that crushing lack of institutional control charge. That now brings the number up from 13 football rules violations from last year's NOA to 21 by current or former members of Ole Miss' football coaching staff.
In a painful 20-plus-minute video announcement Wednesday, Ole Miss athletic director Ross Bjork said the school agreed there was sufficient and credible evidence to support at least three of the new charges, but also he said the school would contest the allegations of lack of institutional control and the charge against Freeze for failure to monitor.
Freeze, Bjork and Ole Miss chancellor Jeff Vitter stood by one another. In the face of what could be a major NCAA hammer dropping on the Ole Miss football program, these three sat together, saying they would fight to clear what they felt the NCAA got wrong while admitting fault to some new charges.
At the end of the day, Ole Miss admitted it was wrong. It admitted it cheated, and all the defending and defiance Freeze showed in the face of accusations is now coming back to haunt him.
No coach would come clean in the public domain that Freeze so adamantly defended his program in, but Freeze will now be skewered in the court of public opinion -- and possibly by the NCAA -- for how outspoken he was. Whether he knew if anything improper was taking place under his watch or not, the arrogance some people think he showed during this could hamstring him when he and the school lay out their case in front of the NCAA.
It's hard to fault a coach for defending his program, especially when cheating is alleged, but Freeze's constant public opposition to critics and perceived moral high ground is now in total question. His honesty is now in doubt.
Fair or not, that's where Freeze and Ole Miss stand right now.
"The people over there live in their own world and believe that because they think they believe certain things that it will all work out fine," a former Ole Miss assistant told ESPN. "They all believed they were invincible."
An invincibility complex is something the NCAA will have to wonder about as it decides how to further punish Ole Miss, which already lost 11 scholarships, fired coaches alleged to have been involved in wrongdoing and took coaches off the road during peak recruiting times. It also will lose close to $8 million after forfeiting its share of SEC postseason revenues for this coming season.
The fight will persist as the school prepares its official response to the NCAA within the next 90 days, before going in front of the NCAA's Committee on Infractions later this year. But Ole Miss is now backed into a corner, at the mercy of what could be a merciless NCAA.
There's a charge that a former Ole Miss staff member provided improper recruiting lodging and transportation to two prospects who enrolled at other schools. A former staff member also allegedly committed unethical conduct by providing false and misleading information to Ole Miss and the NCAA about his involvement in the recruiting violations.
"They all believed they were invincible."Former Ole Miss assistant coach
Then there's the charge that a former Ole Miss staff member arranged for a recruit, who signed elsewhere, to receive cash payments from two boosters totaling $13,000 to $15,600.
The funny thing is that all of the NFL draft night drama surrounding star left tackle Laremy Tunsil didn't even make the NCAA's new NOA, likely meaning that the NCAA was still investigating the school before that colossal flub came up.
"I am extremely disappointed to learn that any member of my staff violated any SEC or NCAA rules, and as the head coach, I regret those actions," Freeze said Wednesday. "Any behavior by my staff that is inconsistent with that commitment to do things the right way simply does not reflect the emphasis I personally place on NCAA compliance."
And that's what Freeze will have to sell to the Committee of Infractions if he hopes to get that possible career-killing lack of institutional control wiped from the record. It's important to note that Freeze is not named in any of the violations, and the university -- along with Freeze -- must be able to keep the head coach's direct distance as far from the allegations as possible. However, the constantly mocked-and-ridiculed NCAA is going to be under immense pressure to drop the proverbial hammer on Ole Miss: The program's meteoric rise under Freeze was too suspicious for people inside and outside of the conference to accept.
That brings us to Freeze's future at Ole Miss. The lack of institutional control charge could have a profound effect on Bjork's future with the school and the futures of other Ole Miss administrators, while the violations of coaching responsibility by Freeze could at the very least deliver a suspension to Freeze during the upcoming season. Ole Miss has imposed a one-year bowl ban, but the question now becomes whether the NCAA feels one year is severe enough. There's a point to drive home in order to deter this sort of behavior in the future, and if the NCAA deems that Ole Miss' own punishments aren't enough, another postseason ban -- along with the possibility of more lost scholarships -- could be crippling for Ole Miss.
Could Freeze -- and even Bjork -- survive a two-year bowl ban? Who knows, but Ole Miss has to be prepared to weigh its options when it comes to the future of the program. One SEC assistant wondered whether cutting ties with Freeze early could help send a strong message to the NCAA about how seriously the school takes this, which could result in a more lenient punishment from the NCAA.
Maybe that's too rash, but no options can be scrapped by Ole Miss at this point. While it lawyers up even more in the coming days, the school is left scrambling to right its wrongs, as it tries to lessen the eventual blow from the NCAA.