Rutgers athletic director resigns over coach abuse scandal

[WestVirginiaRebel]

Yahoo News:

NEW BRUNSWICK, New Jersey (Reuters) - Rutgers University's athletic director on Friday became the latest official to exit New Jersey's largest public college, three days after revelations that its former basketball coach abused players and berated them with homophobic slurs.

The school's president, Robert Barchi, held the support of Rutgers' board of governors, and state Governor Chris Christie commended his "decisive leadership" after Barchi fired the coach, Mike Rice, and negotiated the exit of Athletic Director Tim Pernetti.

Barchi, who took the top job at the 58,000-student school in September, said he regretted not acting sooner after learning last year of a video of Rice's behavior. At the time, Pernetti suspended Rice.

"This was a failure of process. I regret that I did not ask to see the video when Tim first told me of its existence," Barchi said at the school's New Brunswick campus on Friday.

Barchi said he viewed the video with Pernetti after its release by ESPN on Tuesday provoked outrage among Rutgers' fans, students and faculty. He fired Rice the next day.

On Friday, he said he had been "deeply disturbed" by the images of Rice hitting players and shouting slurs at them, behavior that he described as "much more abusive and pervasive" than he had expected.

The scandal broke as college basketball races through its championships, televised matchups that go on through weeks of "March Madness" playoffs ahead of this weekend's "Final Four." The TV deals are big moneymakers for basketball powerhouses like those in the Big East conference, where Rutgers competed this season, and the Big Ten conference, which it is joining.

While the college athletes play without a salary, Rice last year was paid $655,000 in the third year of his five-year contract at the partly state-funded university.

"I commend President Barchi for his decisive leadership in coming to an agreement with Mr. Pernetti to have the Athletic Department of Rutgers University come under new leadership," said Governor Christie, a Republican seen as a contender for the 2016 presidential nomination.

"This entire incident was regrettable and while it has damaged the reputation of our state university, we need to move forward now."

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Court bully fallout.