Medgar Evers men’s basketball coach Brian Nigro believes the CUNY Athletic Conference committed a flagrant foul against his team.
The Cougars lost to Lehman in the quarterfinals of the conference tournament, only for Lehman to later report it had played an ineligible player in its semifinal victory over John Jay.
Nigro said the league commissioner emailed him and wrote how they had been eliminated by a team with an ineligible player, but a Lehman spokesperson told The Post that CUNYAC told the school Friday that the player’s eligibility for the Medgar Evers game was still under review and no decision had been made regarding potentially nullifying that game.
The league — now run by Mammoth Sports Consulting — decided to push John Jay through to the finals, where the Bloodhounds will meet top-seeded Baruch on Friday night at 7 p.m.
Nigro’s squad received no justice for facing a team with what he had been told was an ineligible player.
“How could you just advance one team without the other?” Nigro told The Post. “To me, it’s like criminal to do that. I feel for my kids more than anybody at this point because it was just not right what was done.”
The Division III CUNYAC tournament became engulfed by a scandal Wednesday when Lehman — located in The Bronx — learned that one its players had “administratively withdrawn” from classes.
That designation meant a player had not been attending classes he should have, according to a school spokesperson.
The statement said the player contributed to the 74-63 victory over second-seeded John Jay on Tuesday, but did not mention last Saturday’s 98-66 quarterfinal blowout win over sixth-seeded Medgar Egars.
Nigro said league commissioner Dr. Kurt Patberg emailed him regarding what he described as his team’s elimination by a team with an ineligible player, in contrast to what the league told Lehman.
The Post sent multiple emails to CUNY officials that went unreturned Friday.
Lehman claims to have immediately contacted the league after learning of the violation, and the school announced Wednesday night in a statement it had withdrawn from the tournament after consulting with the conference’s administrators.
“Lehman College acknowledges the unfortunate circumstances that led to the withdrawal of our men’s basketball team from the CUNYAC Championship and recognizes the impact this has had on our student-athletes, coaches, and their supporters,” the school told The Post in a statement. “We remain committed to supporting our athletes and continuously strengthening our processes to enhance their experience.”
Nigro believes Lehman did not purposefully compete with the ineligible player.
“I think it was an administrative error, which was really unfortunate for Lehman’s players and staff and school,” he said. “However it happened, it happened.
“I definitely do not think it was deliberately done where they played an ineligible player. I also know the athletic director quite a long time at Lehman and we had some dialogue back and forth when this happened and I know they would not do that.”
Wednesday’s statement, posted to the conference’s website, contained the details that John Jay and Baruch would now clash for the conference title.
Nigro said the league held a meeting with its commissioners and athletic directors Thursday where two proposals were floated, with neither being approved.
Medgar Evers championed for it and Jay to play each other Friday night since they were on the same side of the bracket, with the winner advancing to face Baruch on Sunday.
Nigro, who did not attend the meeting, heard that Baruch could not host games Saturday and Sunday.
“I feel the league kind of abruptly put this post out and declared John Jay in the finals game without even considering Medgar Evers at all initially,” Nigro, in his fourth year with the program, said. “That was kind of a slap in the face to not really evaluate the situation at hand first or consider the fact this kid was ineligible for our game and how that affects our program and institution.”
Baruch, the No. 1 seed and regular-season champion, put forward an idea for it to be named the automatic bid for the NCAA Tournament if John Jay and Medgar Evers did not play each other.
Nigro said he had no issues with that proposal, but it was “shut down immediately” because the conference insisted on having a championship game.
He added that logistics had also been cited to him as the reason for the decision.
The conference tournament had to be finished by Sunday before the selection show Monday.
“To me, this a complete embarrassment and disgrace to us,” Nigro said of the reasoning. “Not even a public acknowledgment or apology to our program on how this was handled.”