The Michigan Wolverines football program has been handed a multimillion-dollar penalty and head coach Sherrone Moore has been given an additional suspension as part of a sign-sealing scandal involving former Michigan football staffer Connor Stalions, the NCAA said on Friday.
In the NCAA’s statement on their decision, they said the majority of the penalties come as a result of the “impermissible scouting scheme” orchestrated by Stalions, who worked as a member of then-head coach Jim Harbaugh’s staff. Stalions was levied with an 8-year show-cause order, restricting him from all athletically related activities during that period.
Harbaugh was given a 10-year show-cause order in the sign-stealing case. That punishment would begin on August 7, 2028, after a separate 4-year show-cause order ends from a separate recruiting case that the NCAA closed last year.
In Friday’s statement, the NCAA said the program under Harbaugh, now leading the NFL’s Los Angeles Chargers, had “committed violations involving an off-campus, in-person scouting scheme, impermissible recruiting inducements and communications, head coach responsibility rules, individuals’ failures to cooperate and Michigan’s failure to monitor.”
CNN has reached out to Michigan and Harbaugh for comment.
ESPN reports, citing sources, that it’s expected the size of the fine, when considering past Big Ten Conference revenues and projections, to be more than $20 million.
Across three seasons, Stalions “directed and arranged for individuals to conduct off-campus, in-person scouting of Michigan’s future regular-season opponents,” a network referred to as the “KGB.”
According to the NCAA, Stalions purchased tickets and transferred them to those individuals who “filmed the signal callers on the future opponents’ sidelines and then provided that film to Stalions.”
Through that film, Stalions was able to decipher the signals of Michigan’s opponents.
The NCAA said that Stalions spent “significant resources” on the scheme, including nearly $35,000 on tickets in 2022. The investigation found that 56 instances of off-campus, in-person scouting of 13 future opponents took place.
The NCAA added that “the true scope and scale of the scheme – including the competitive advantage it conferred – will never be known due to individuals’ intentional destruction and withholding of materials and information.”
Current Wolverines head coach Moore, who was an assistant coach under Harbaugh at the time, has been given a two-year show-cause order and a three-game ban. Michigan had already suspended Moore for two games this upcoming season, with the NCAA now adding another, which will be served in the first game of the 2026-27 season.
The NCAA explained that Moore’s penalty was handed out because of a “failure to cooperate violation,” adding that he “deleted his entire 52-message text thread with Stalions off his personal phone and deleted from his school-issued phone a single text that was part of a broader thread that referenced Stalions standing by Moore during a game and staff.”
Stalions was also found to have failed to cooperate with the investigation. He told an intern to “clear out” emails, texts, photos and videos related to the scheme and he admitted to throwing a phone into a pond to dispose of evidence.
“In short, Stalions’ multiple and repeated failures to cooperate are some of the worst the COI (Committee on Infractions) has ever seen,” the NCAA infractions panel said.
The ruling said that Harbaugh’s failure to provide the required records when asked and failing to attend an interview with staff led to his punishment.
Sign-stealing, the practice of gathering information on the signs a team uses to call offensive and defensive plays, is technically not prohibited under NCAA rules unless electronic communication is intercepted in-game. However, in-person scouting is explicitly outlawed by the rule book.
NCAA bylaw 11.6.1 states: “Off-campus, in-person scouting of future opponents (in the same season) is prohibited.”
In 2023, Harbaugh was suspended for the team’s first three games of the season, a self-imposed sanction by Michigan’s athletics department, amid allegations of recruiting violations.
The NCAA then opened a second, separate investigation into the Wolverines in October 2023 for the alleged sign-stealing, leading to the suspension and subsequent resignation of Stalions. Linebackers coach Chris Partridge was later fired. Citing language from his termination letter, Partridge said in a statement posted on social media on November 27, 2023, that he was fired “because of a failure ‘to abide by the University directive not to discuss an ongoing NCAA investigation with anyone associated with the Michigan Football program.’”
“I want to be clear: I had no knowledge of any in-person or illegal scouting, or illegal sign stealing,” Partridge said in his online statement. “Additionally, at no point did I destroy any evidence related to an ongoing investigation.”
Harbaugh consistently denied knowledge of any scheme to steal other teams’ signs.
Michigan went on to win the national championship over the Washington Huskies on January 8, 2024, its first since the 1997 season. Days later, Harbaugh left to become the head coach of the Chargers.
In August 2024, the NCAA announced Harbaugh was hit with a 4-year show-cause penalty related to the recruiting case and would be suspended for one season if he was hired during the show-cause order.
The Wolverines begin their season August 30 at home against New Mexico State.
This is a developing story and will be updated.
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