Report: Notre Dame suspends men's swimming program for 2024-25 year for 'corrosive culture,' gambling

Notre Dame has suspended their entire upcoming men’s swimming season per reporting by Pat Forde.

The suspension is due to culture issues, including gambling, within the program.

“Notre Dame is suspending its men’s swimming program for the entire 2024-25 academic year after investigations revealed swimmers created an internal sportsbook to gamble on their performances, plus other ‘corrosive culture’ issues,” Forde wrote in his tweet.

Fighting Irish AD Pete Bevacqua has since released a statement on the suspension of the program.

“The external review confirmed and expanded on our initial concerns about a deeply embedded team culture dismissive of Notre Dame’s standards for student-athletes, including our expectation that they treat one another with dignity and respect. This independent, external review also documented numerous violations of NCAA rules prohibiting gambling on intercollegiate swimming and other athletic competitions despite clear and recurrent training provided to all our student-athletes by our Athletics Compliance staff about those rules,” Bevacqua wrote. “These findings are contrary to the University’s values and all that we stand for in Notre Dame Athletics.

“In order to ensure that this behavior ends and to rebuild a culture of dignity, respect, and exemplary conduct, we have decided to suspend the men’s swimming program for at least one academic year,” continued Bevacqua. “While individual conduct varied, the overwhelming cultural dynamic on the team necessitates a full suspension. We profoundly regret that the small number of team members who did not participate in the conduct, and those who were planning on joining the team this fall, will also suffer the consequences of this decision.”

This decision does not impact any of the coaching staff for Notre Dame. The investigation found they had no knowledge of the matter, any of these behaviors, or their extent due to the concealment by the student-athletes.

This outcome also does not affect the women’s swimming team or either diving programs.

Per Forde’s reporting, the gambling related to over-under wagers involving swim times during meets. Sources also said there were bets involving the basketball postseason in the NCAA Tournament. The former would lead to more severe punishments, though, with it involving their own sport and school.

With classes beginning on August 27th in South Bend, this announcement, which officials informed the team of today, gives swimmers, especially freshmen and those uninvolved, time to enter the portal. It would allow the same to those involved but this matter would complicate their respective transfers.

This comes a little over a year after updates came to guidelines involving gambling in Division I of the NCAA. Punishments include rules and prevention education along with varying levels of eligibility loss depending on what sports the athletes bet on and how much they wagered.

“We deeply value our responsibilities as educators and our commitment to our student-athletes, and will work with other University offices as appropriate to provide support to those affected by our decision,” wrote Bevacqua. “While we are certainly disappointed by the actions that led to the decision, we recognize that our students make mistakes, and our goal is to educate and support them to the best of our ability.

“As stated at the launch of the review, we take seriously our obligation to foster a community of student-athletes who not only compete and perform at the highest level academically and athletically, but whose conduct reflects the University’s values. We hope this decision sends a clear and unequivocal message reaffirming that commitment and expectation,” Bevacqua closed. “As we do after any major action, we will continue to review our internal processes and reporting structures to ensure that we are doing all that we can to nurture a positive experience for all Notre Dame student-athletes. We will work even harder to provide a welcoming and safe community for all our students.”