Sharife Cooper was one of the top-rated players to ever commit to Auburn basketball, but now his eligibility status is unclear days before Auburn’s season opener.
Cooper has not been practicing because of eligibility questions ahead of Auburn’s Thursday opener against Saint Joseph’s in Fort Myers, Fla, ESPN first reported. The school is waiting on the NCAA committee to put out a ruling on the subject.
Until a decision is made, ESPN reported Cooper is not expected to participate in practices or games. Auburn coach Bruce Pearl has not made a statement about the topic, although an update is expected Monday.
Cooper was the third person in Auburn history to be a McDonald’s All-American, and he was ranked the No. 5 point guard in his signing class. In high school, he averaged 30.6 points his senior season. As a freshman, he was expected to start and help a young Auburn team that lost all five of its starters from the 2019-2020 season.
Cooper enrolled at Auburn and worked out with the team through the summer and the preseason, but he has not been participating in practice recently. Instead, freshman Justin Powell and sophomore Tyrell Jones have been running the Auburn offense from the point.
Cooper has been exploring his options, including playing professionally in Europe or Australia if he’s not eligible, ESPN reported. His preference, though, is believed to be to stay and play at Auburn.
The news comes less than 24 hours after Auburn announced it had self-imposed a postseason ban for the 2020-21 season. That decision came as a result of a federal investigation that included former assistant Chuck Person. The FBI investigated corruption in college basketball and arrested Person in 2017 as well as three other college basketball assistant coaches. The investigation also led to two players, Austin Wiley and Danjel Purifoy, sitting out a season. They returned to participate in the 2019 season and have since graduated.
“This was a difficult decision but the right decision,” Pearl said in a statement released Sunday. “I hate it for our current players. They lost the opportunity for the postseason last year because of COVID, and now they will miss the postseason again. It’s a two-year postseason penalty for them. However, we need to take this penalty now to put it behind us.”
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