By Aidan Joly
A few weeks ago on this blog, I wrote that when the mighty fall, it’s rarely a soft landing.
However, it’s surprising to see how bad it has gotten between Bob Huggins and the school he coached at for 16 years, West Virginia.
When he resigned and retired last month after a drunk driving arrest in Pittsburgh, many assumed that he needed some level of help, but he would be alright eventually and might be able to repair the relationship eventually.
That’s not going to happen anymore. As of Tuesday, there have been four letters sent back and forth between Huggins through his attorney and the school, with Huggins claiming he never resigned from his position at WVU and said that the statement put out by West Virginia announcing his resignation was not written by him.
On Monday he doubled down, claiming he checked into a “world class rehabilitation center” and would return to his coaching duties.
He has also threatened legal action against the school if he is not reinstated as head coach. Huggins’ lawyer claims that the resignation came from a text message written by Huggins’ wife.
West Virginia has twice responded, first calling Huggins’ claims “completely factually inaccurate” and said that Huggins told his players in person he was resigning and told university officials in an email.
WVU pushed back again on Monday, saying “there is no support in the law or on these facts to suggest that Mr. Huggins may now ignore his resignation and his actions upon which all have relied, undo his voluntary separation, and return to work as if none of this ever occurred.”
It went on: “But let me again restate the obvious: the university will not accept Mr. Huggins’ attempted revocation of his resignation, nor will it reinstate him as head coach of the men’s basketball program.”
Several players have already transferred out of the program, which has promoted assistant coach Josh Eilert as interim coach for the 2023-24 season.
This is a man who made anti-gay comments on a radio show in May that got him suspended and fined. Five weeks later, he blew a .21 and got arrested for drunk driving. This is clearly not a man who is fit to coach college basketball.
Instead, he is choosing to be a distraction to Eilert and the players who remain in Morgantown. It’s surprising that people in his circle are not advising him better. It’s one of the uglier breakups we’ve seen in college sports in recent memory.
Really, it’s mind-boggling what is happening here. Huggins could have moved on from coaching and eventually return to West Virginia to be properly honored for his career.
Now, any chance of that happening is out the window in this ridiculous and sad saga.
AJ Hoops 