Former UCLA basketball assistant may have committed NCAA violation

Former UCLA assistant men’s basketball coach Scott Duncan may have committed a secondary NCAA violation in December by making on-the-record comments to a reporter about a player the Bruins were recruiting.

According to a Sports Illustrated article published this week, Duncan discussed with reporter Bruce Schoenfeld the prospect of landing Jordan Tebbutt, a 6-foot-5 junior swingman from Tualatin, Ore.

“I can’t do a lot with Jordan Tebbutt at this tournament — just make sure he sees me at the game, wave to his dad and mom, and that’s it,” Duncan told the reporter. “Anybody in a UCLA shirt could do it.”

College coaches are generally forbidden from publicly discussing players who have not signed a binding letter of intent. UCLA spokesman Marc Dellins said Monday the university was examining the situation with its compliance office and would work with Pacific 10 Conference officials to determine if a secondary violation occurred.

Mike Matthews, Pac-10 associate commissioner, said details about the potential violation were still being gathered.

“On the surface of things, it looks like a very, very secondary violation,” Matthews said. “I wouldn’t expect that the penalty would be terribly severe based on the facts as I understand them so far.”

Duncan, who left UCLA in April to become associate head coach at Wyoming under Larry Shyatt, did not immediately return a phone call seeking comment. He had been the Bruins’ point man on recruiting since the departure of Kerry Keating in 2007.

The Sports Illustrated article also included comments from Washington assistant Raphael Chillious about a pair of prospects — Tebbutt and ninth-grader Justin Jackson — whom the Huskies were targeting.

ben.bolch@latimes.com