After NCAA notice of allegations, Oregon’s Kelly Graves speaks out

News first broke a week ago that the Oregon women’s basketball program was facing possible NCAA infractions after self-reporting violations.

Now, head coach Kelly Graves, who was personally named in the notice of allegations, isn’t shying away from his responsibility.

Graves spoke to The Oregonian about the allegations against the program. The NCAA has alleged that between December 2016 and April 2017, Graves failed to monitor the program while an assistant strength and conditioning coach took part in on the court, basketball-related activities.

According to the NCAA, there are more than 30 alleged instances where the coach "provided technical or tactical basketball instruction," in either individual workout sessions or following practices. The strength and conditioning coach’s involvement means the school technically exceeded the NCAA’s four coach limit.

"I'm the head coach," Graves told The Oregonian. "It falls on me, and that's OK. I'll accept what happens out of this but listen, I'm focused on going forward and really working with this team because I think we can do some great things. We'll learn from our mistakes."

He continued on by telling The Oregonian that the program takes the infractions seriously.

"We made some mistakes and actually we were the ones that turned ourselves in on that once we realized we were doing something we weren't supposed to," he said. "In the grand scheme of things it's not really anything major. Those are infractions, but we do take them serious. It's something I knew better, our staff knew better but I don't think it's affected us as a team.

"It just goes to show even an old dog like me, sometimes we make mistakes and need to learn from them and make sure that they don't happen again."