Some and members of the media are calling for Rick Pitino to step down at the University of Louisville amid allegations that one of his former staffers hired escorts to have sex with basketball recruits when they visited the University’s campus.
But his son, Gophers men’s basketball coach Richard Pitino, is standing by his father.
The elder Pitino has denied any knowledge of accusations made by Katrina Powell, who wrote a book about being an escort and stripper inside Louisville dorm rooms for visiting recruits. ESPN‘s “Outside the Lines” added to Powell’s accusations with a report on Tuesday, thus intensifying the pressure on Pitino and the U of L.
Powell claims former Louisville staffer Andre McGee paid her and other women to dance and have sex with recruits. ESPN backed that part of the story.
“I hate seeing him go through it,” Richard Pitino said Wednesday, according to 1500 ESPN. “But at the end of the day I know that he had zero knowledge of any of those alleged things. And you kind of go from there. But time will tell. I think it’s a long way from knowing what the truth will be.”
Rick Pitino has denied any knowledge of the accusations against the program, and he’s getting the support of Louisville athletics director Tom Jurich.
“He has no plans to step down,” Jurich said of Pitino, via the Louisville Courier-Journal. “He has a long-term contract. He absolutely did not know anything about these allegations.”
Despite cries by many that Rick Pitino should go his boss AD Tom Jurich says he has his support. https://t.co/SbEPHVIoD2
— Dick Vitale (@DickieV) October 21, 2015
Richard was an assistant under his father at Louisville from 2007-09, but he too says he wasn’t aware of any wrongdoing.
“I never ever heard any of that, saw any of that,” he said, via the Star Tribune. “That would have shocked any of us and that would have been addressed immediately.”
