Widening an inquiry into whether kickbacks were accepted for steering students to loan providers, state Attorney General Andrew Cuomo announced that his office had served the athletics departments — 38 in the NCAA's top-tier Division I — with subpoenas and records requests.

Also subpoenaed was a Florida-based loan provider, Student Financial Services Inc., doing business as University Financial Services.

"We suspect that UFS has relationships with these athletic departments," Cuomo spokesman Jeffrey Lerner said, "and we want to know exactly what these relationships entail."

At least a dozen of the schools feature loan-consolidation links on their athletics web sites that take viewers to a UFS page customized with schools' colors.

Cuomo's office said it is investigating whether the athletics departments evaluated UFS' interest rates before recommending its loans or whether "their endorsement of UFS was based purely on payments from the lender." Among the records subpoenaed and requested are documents showing UFS payments and any benefits given by UFS to any school employee, "including meals, trips and other perks."

At Kansas, associate athletics director Jim Marchiony reacted angrily. The school "does not have a relationship with UFS," he said, explaining that KU's multimedia rights-holder — formerly ESPN Regional, now Host Communications — contracted with UFS.

Schools often sell television, radio and other media rights to Host and other companies, which recoup their costs by selling sponsorships. There is a link to UFS on the Kansas athletics department home page. "We don't refer anyone to them. We don't suggest they go to UFS. UFS has bought the same sponsorship your local grocery store will buy," Marchiony said.

Before targeting athletics, Cuomo's investigation of ties between lenders and universities has generated more than $10 million in settlements from lenders and universities. It uncovered cases in which schools steered loans illegally to lenders; schools and lenders struck revenue-sharing agreements; financial aid directors received gifts, trips and stock and university call centers were staffed by lending company employees.

Because the announcement of Cuomo's venture in athletics was made in a press release and without prior knowledge by the schools involved, some of the athletic departments say they were blindsided.

"If they think they've got something, they're going to be sorely disappointed. Sorely disappointed," said Marchiony. "If they had done some homework ... they could have figured this out before throwing subpoenas out."

At UCLA, spokesman Marc Dellins said, "This athletic department does not have an agreement with that (loan) company." Loans for UCLA athletes, Dellins said, "are arranged through the UCLA financial aid office just as (they are for) any other student on campus. We do not act independently of the university."

Other schools such as Rutgers and Louisville simply acknowledged received records requests from Cuomo. Auburn spokesman Kirk Sampson said the school "has no preferred provider of student financial aid ... (but) will thoroughly examine and respond to any suggestion that the university's name, logo or any representation of it has been used improperly in connection with specific lenders."

In a statement, UFS said, "The relationships between our company and athletic departments of various colleges and universities are part of our generalized marketing efforts, the same as advertising at any sporting event, and do not involve the financial aid departments of the schools involved." The company said it "plans to fully cooperate" with Cuomo's office.

The athletics inquiry arose from an agreement uncovered between Dowling College, a Division II school in Oakdale, N.Y., and Student Financial Services Inc., which does business as University Financial Services. According to Cuomo's office, the Dowling athletics director was to receive $75 for every loan application funneled from the athletic department, and the department would place links to UFS on its web site and give out promotional materials to steer students toward UFS loans.

Under a settlement reached in May, Dowling terminated the relationship and signed a Cuomo-drawn code of conduct. School spokesperson Kelly Kazemier said no student had taken out a loan with UFS, and Cuomo's office confirmed the school never received money under the arrangement.

"This was misrepresented to our athletic director and as soon as he discovered what was going on he turned the information over to senior administration at Dowling and then we immediately terminated the agreement and then we released the information to Attorney General Cuomo," said Kazemier. "No student has ever entered into any agreement with UFS and the college didn't benefit in any way."

Still, Cuomo spokesman Jeffrey Lerner said today, "The first rock we turned over led us to financial aid offices and then to financial aid officers and then to alumni associations. Because of Dowling, that has led us to athletic departments with relationships with UFS. ... What we've learned is, more often than not, the relationship we found at one school was duplicated at other schools."

Lerner said when Cuomo's office looked at alumni associations, it subpoenaed 120.

Athletes who could have received loans are most likely not basketball players in Division I or football players in the NCAA's Football Bowl Division (formerly known as Division I-A) since they are on full scholarships. But thousands of athletes in other sports receive either partial or no athletics aid and could be in need of loans. Also affected could be student managers and trainers and other athletics department student workers. Lerner said the probe is looking at students who were not athletes as well. "We want to know how deep and far this goes," he said.

Kansas is one of at least a dozen schools on Cuomo's list whose athletics web site features a loan-consolidation link to a UFS page. However, Marchiony said, that space was sold by the school's media-rights holder, which sells a number of such sponsorships to recoup rights fees it pays. "We don't receive any money from UFS per capita (based on loan applications or closed loans)," Marchiony said.