Rick Pitino 'Fired' By Louisville Amid Scandal

LOUISVILLE, KY — A day after federal officials announced charges against college basketball coaches in an alleged bribery scheme that lured top athletes to major university programs, the University of Louisville has announced that it placed legendary coach Rick Pitino on unpaid administrative leave, which means Pitino has been "effectively fired," his attorney said.

In a press conference Wednesday afternoon, Louisville interim president Greg Postel also announced that Athletic Director Tom Jurich has been placed on paid administrative leave, and the university will name an interim head coach and athletic director, possibly within 48 hours.

"Administrative leave is administrative leave," Postel said. "It is not a dismissal; that is one of the possible outcomes." However, Pitino has been "effectively fired," his attorney, Steve Pence, told the Courier Journal.

Postel also announced that "one student athlete" has been notified that he will be "withheld from NCAA activities, including games and practices, indefinitely."

The FBI released evidence that one of Pitino's assistants planned to pay $100,000 to the father of a recruit, who is believed to be Brian Bowen, an incoming freshman on the Louisville team, according to Sports Illustrated and the Courier Journal.

Pitino and Jurich each had short meetings with Postel Wednesday morning. Kent Taylor, a reporter with NBC affiliate WAVE, tweeted that the university asked Jurich to fire Pitino, Jurich refused, and both were let go.

Watch the press conference here:

Pitino, who also coached the NBA's New York Knicks and Boston Celtics, is the only coach in NCAA history to win championships with two different schools: Louisville and its arch rival, Kentucky. (For more on this and other Louisville stories, sign up for free Patch breaking news alerts and daily newsletters.)

On Tuesday, U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York Joon Kim announced charges against 10 people, including assistant coaches at four major college programs and an Adidas executive, in an alleged scheme in which bribes were paid to send top players to certain colleges as well as steer them to managers and financial advisers.

The assistant coaches charged are from the University of Southern California, Oklahoma State, Auburn and Arizona.

The three federal complaints — in addition to referring to the named defendants — also refer to a dozen college basketball players who go unnamed as well as two other universities that sources said are Louisville and Miami.

On Tuesday, Postel acknowledged Louisville is tied to the federal bribery probe. The federal complaints accuse an assistant coach of scheming this summer to funnel $100,000 from Adidas to a recruit.

A coach was also caught on an FBI video negotiating payment for another recruit, according to court documents. The coach, who prosecutors do not identify, said his school was on probation and "we gotta be very low key," according to court documents.

Louisville is currently under NCAA sanctions following an alleged prostitution and recruiting scandal in the basketball program. Pitino had already been suspended for the first five ACC games of the 2017-18 season after the NCAA investigation into that case.

"These allegations come as a complete shock to me,” Pitino said in a statement on Tuesday. “If true, I agree with the U.S. Attorney's Office that these third-party schemes, initiated by a few bad actors, operated to commit a fraud on the impacted universities and their basketball programs, including the University of Louisville. Our fans and supporters deserve better and I am committed to taking whatever steps are needed to ensure those responsible are held accountable. But the FBI and the United States Department of Justice have come to clean up the sport and the mess made by Louisville and other programs.”

Photo credit: Joe Robbins/ Stringer/ Getty Images Sport/ Getty Images