UNLV Allowed to Defend Its Title : Basketball: University agrees to forfeit live TV appearances next season and to sit out NCAA tournament in spring of 1992.

UNLV will be allowed to defend its national basketball title after all.

In an unprecedented reversal, the NCAA said today that the top-ranked Rebels can play in this spring’s tournament if they agree to one of two conditions.

UNLV readily agreed to forfeit live television appearances during the 1991-92 season and to sit out the NCAA tournament in the spring of ’92.

The other alternative would have been for Coach Jerry Tarkanian to sit out this year’s tournament and for the school to skip the ’92 tournament.

If not for the NCAA’s change of heart, UNLV would have become the second national basketball champion to be barred from defending its title. The first was Kansas, which won the 1988 NCAA title but had to bypass the ’89 tournament because of recruiting violations.

The Rebels, who returned four starters from the team that captured UNLV’s first national championship last year, were told in July they could not defend their title as a result of the 1977 case between UNLV and the NCAA.

That year, the NCAA ordered the university to suspend Tarkanian for two years because of violations in the basketball program.

Tarkanian, however, won a court injunction prohibiting the university from suspending him. The case went to the U.S. Supreme Court, which did not overturn the injunction but said the NCAA has the power to discipline its members.

This case is separate from another investigation into UNLV’s recruitment of Lloyd Daniels, which is pending.

The NCAA’s announcement in June that the Rebels could not defend their title triggered protests from UNLV officials and fans, many of whom noted that the current players were only children when the original infractions were said to have occurred.

UNLV requested another meeting with the committee and in July offered four alternative penalties.

In their decision announced today, the committee members rejected outright all four alternatives the school presented at their meeting in Chicago. They were:

That UNLV would be banned from the 1992 tournament.

That Tarkanian be suspended from coaching in the 1992 tournament.

That Tarkanian be suspended from coaching in the 1991 tournament as well as forfeit his contractual right to a share of UNLV’s tournament proceeds; that he be suspended from all recruiting for one year; that the basketball program be limited to 15 official visits for recruits for 1991-92, and that the program undergo supervised monitoring each six months for two years.

That scholarship limits be reduced from 15 to 13 for 1991-92; that official visits be reduced from 18 to nine for 1991-92; that no off-campus recruiting be permitted by any member of the basketball staff for one year while the Rebels make no network television appearances for 1991-92.