When Shooting Hoops Turns To Lawsuits

On January 15, 2026, Pennsylvania prosecutors revealed a case that charged 26 individuals, more than a dozen who were former NCAA players and the others being bettors who would bribe the players to point-shave for them. These others are described as “fixers” since they would rig the games a certain way to favor the bets they placed against the players involved.

According to the indictment revealed by prosecutors, these fixers started with games in the Chinese Basketball Association (CBA) for the 2022–2023 season and integrated the rigged games into the NCAA seasons as recently as the past 2025 season in January. Twenty players total were charged, and Antonio Blakeney was mentioned in the case. Fifteen of the twenty players engaged in this scheme in the NCAA Division I 2024–2025 season, and the other five played in the NCAA 2023–2024 season.

The Origins of the Scheme

According to prosecutors, such as David Metcalf from the Pennsylvania Eastern District, this all began in 2022 when Shane Hennen and Marves Fairly recruited former NBA player Antonio Blakeney. At the time, Blakeney played for the Chinese Basketball Association and was bribed to play poorly and point-shave.

He not only played along with the fixers’ scheme but went on to recruit his teammates and have them play along with the scheme of things—losing games to favor the bettors and receiving payments for doing so.

Hennen and Fairly would then go on to defraud sportsbooks and other bettors by betting against Blakeney’s team, knowing that Blakeney’s team would play poorly prior to the game even starting and win due to the game being rigged in their favor. By the end of the season, Blakeney received around $200,000 in his storage locker. While he was mentioned in the indictment, he was not one of the players charged.

Expansion Into the NCAA

After this, Hennen and Fairly integrated the scheme into the NCAA and involved thirty-nine players over the course of 17 various NCAA Division I teams. Only twenty of the thirty-nine players were charged.

Players that were charged and worth mentioning are Elijah Gray, Micawber Etienne, Simeon Cottle, Carlos Hart, Camian Shell, and Oumar Koureissi. Four of these players—Cottle, Hart, Shell, and Koureissi—have played for their teams in the past week but have no allegations for this season.

Since then, Eastern Michigan has stated that Hart is currently suspended from all team activities pending the outcome of the case. Kennesaw State released that Cottle is completely and indefinitely suspended from team activities.

With these charges, those who were prosecuted are facing years of sentencing. The wire fraud charges can be a maximum of up to twenty years, while bribery charges are a maximum of five years.

The ring of bettors grew from the original two, Hennen and Fairly, to a total of five fixers convicted due to connections within the sport.

Metcalf stated, “They picked these men because they were well connected in the world of basketball… trainers, recruiters, networkers, people of influence, and because of that influence, they added gravitas and legitimacy to the scheme.”

This scheme went on and is said to have happened in at least 29 games spanning across the 2023–2024 and 2024–2025 seasons.

According to the prosecutors, the five others, who were “fixers,” include: two men who worked in training and development of the players, one who was a trainer and former coach, one being a former NCAA player, and the last two described as gamblers that were influencers and sports handicappers.

Rigged Games Worth Mentioning

In February of 2024, the game of Robert Morris against Northern Kentucky was one of the many games involved. One of the Robert Morris players, Markeese Hastings, was caught messaging one of his connections in the fixer’s group stating it was “too easy” and that he could keep doing this for them. He became one of the twenty players charged and was charged with sports bribes and wire fraud.

Another game was the matchup of Georgetown against DePaul. A North Carolina basketball trainer, along with a group of bettors, wagered around $27,000 in favor of Georgetown winning. They recruited four DePaul players for this game to point-shave, and the players received $40,000 the next day.

The ring of bettors would pay these players to play poorly and then go on to sportsbooks and other bettors to wager against DePaul, and it is said that some crypto exchange was involved with the betting and wire transfers.