To the Ohio State Buckeyes winning is everything no matter the costs. Tonight, the program proved that while embarrassing itself with their investigation of Athletic Director Gene Smith and head football coach Urban Meyer.
Smith will get suspended without pay from August 31st to September 16 and Meyer will miss the first three games to start the Buckeyes’ season.
Ohio State got the opportunity to show the college football world enough is enough when it comes to violence towards women. Florida State failed to do that with Jimbo Fisher and Texas A&M appears well on its way to regretting the hiring. Art Briles at Baylor obviously didn’t do enough and he will never coach another college football program again. The Buckeyes are now on that list.
What makes it particularly worse for Meyer and Ohio State is that it wasn’t a recruit or a player that acted out. Instead an assistant coach.
Meyer had been aware of domestic violence allegations in 2009. No discipline. Instead he chalked it up as “a very young couple.” In 2015, more allegations got made about the same assistant coach. To make matters worse is that he outright lied to the media about his knowledge. Here’s a man considered by many as one of the best coaches around and tasked with being a role model to young men.
Meyer’s the one who will build relationships and trust with his players for several years, yet what does he do? He lies.
He protects said assistant coach. He doesn’t do the right thing. He doesn’t fire him after the second allegation. He can no longer used the excuse this was “a very young couple.” Meyer did apparently let Smith know and still appears no action got taken at the time. Hence the reason for the investigation into Smith’s and Meyer’s conduct after a report surfaced several weeks ago about the domestic violence.
Many Ohio State fans saw Meyer as the one who did what he needed to. Meaning that Smith didn’t do his job and ultimately needed to get fired. When in reality both needed to.
Shameful. The only question now is when will a program actually get it right?