In Baylor's mind, they fired a great coach and must replace him with another great coach. They are reaching out to prospects without any idea of the hammer that may come down on them. They believe they are on par with Ole Miss by self disclosing and self imposing a penalty then it all goes away. Difference is, Baylor didn't just pay a player $15,000. Baylor covered up a series of sexual crimes in order to preserve their football investment. They took away a woman's scholarship in retaliation of her claims. They failed to report. The question at this point is not whether they knew it is whether they SHOULD have known. The fact that this breaks the threshold of the Violence Against Women Act, among others, means that there will be criminal liability for failure to report. These are mandatory federal reporting requirements that Baylor administrators failed to comply with.
This, for as much as Baylor would like to think otherwise, is not just a regular coaching search. This has entered the realm of real criminal action.