Themes set at trial

Big-time college basketball was cast at the opening of a criminal trial Tuesday as a corrupt enterprise where major schools and their heralded coaches rely on athletic gear giants to do their dirty work, paying cash to struggling families of top-tier high school athletes to guide them to their doorstep. Assistant U.S. Attorney Eli Mark repeatedly said the schools are victims and urged a Manhattan federal court jury to convict an Adidas executive and two other men of fraud charges, saying their lies put multiple schools at risk of NCAA sanctions and the loss of millions of dollars. Defense lawyers, though, placed the blame largely on the schools’ lust for basketball glory, saying universities were not innocent in their quest for top athletes who could help attract tens of millions of dollars in donations and revenues. Mark began his opening statement colorfully, describing how $20,000 in cash provided by former Adidas executive James Gatto was stuffed in an envelope and handed to the father of a highly sought-after high school prospect from Michigan,

Brian Bowen, at a 2017 meeting in a New Jersey parking lot. It was a down payment on $100,000 owed to get Bowen to attend Louisville, an Adidas-sponsored program, that could launch him to the NBA, where aspiring agent Christian Dawkins could represent him, Mark said. When the payment to the Bowen family was uncovered, Louisville pulled his scholarship and fired its legendary coach, Rick Pitino. “This is what corruption in college basketball looks like,” the prosecutor told the jury.