Global Courant
Bob Huggins wants to go back to West Virginia. The feeling is not mutual. (Photo by Dylan Buell/Getty Images)
The Bob Huggins situation in West Virginia has somehow gotten even messier.
Three weeks after West Virginia released a statement attributed to Huggins announcing his resignation and retirement following a DUI arrest, an attorney representing the longtime Mountaineers men’s basketball head coach sent a letter to the school alleging that he was in in fact did not resign and demanded reinstatement.
In the letter, obtained by West Virginia Metro News, attorney David A. Campbell claims that Huggins never signed a formal letter of resignation or officially communicated his resignation to anyone in West Virginia. He claimed that West Virginia responded to the DUI arrest by demanding Huggins’ resignation the next day, rather than investigate the matter, which came a month after Huggins came under fire for using an anti- gay slur on a radio show.
Crucially, he claimed that the only notice of resignation the university received was a text message from Huggins’ wife.
Huggins reportedly entered a rehab program after the arrest and now wants to return to the Mountaineers as it nears completion:
Coach Huggins was involved in an incident in Pittsburgh that has now been almost completely resolved without charges. In addition, Coach Huggins has voluntarily sought rehabilitation following the incident to leave no doubt that he is fully capable of returning to his duties as WVU Head Basketball Coach. This rehabilitation was not ordered by the court or any other entity. Rather, to show his dedication to the WVU basketball program, he took the step of joining the program on a voluntary basis. Coach Huggins will soon be released from the program and we will provide you with a full release for Coach Huggins to return to his active duties as head basketball coach at WVU.
West Virginia responds to Bob Huggins’ request for reinstatement
West Virginia responded with a total denial of Huggins’ claims a reply letter, called the claim “completely factually incorrect”.
General Counsel Stephanie Taylor wrote that the letter clashed with what she heard Friday from Bob Fitzsimmons, an attorney who has represented Huggins in other cases. She asked for clarification on who represents Huggins and suggested that Campbell had not carefully investigated the matter.
She also noted that Huggins himself told WVU players that he was resigning, claiming that what Campbell referred to as a text message was in fact an email from Huggins’ wife, saying, “Please accept this correspondence as my formal notice of resignation.” as WVU head basketball coach and as notice of my retirement from West Virginia University, effective immediately.”
Metro news too published the email.
Taylor’s account of how the evening went:
What is clear, however, is that on the evening of June 17, 2023, Mr. Huggins met with members of the men’s basketball staff and student-athletes to announce that he would no longer be coaching the team. At 9:38 pm that same evening, after a series of written and oral communications with Mr. Gianola, who acted as his counsel, Mr. Huggins clearly communicated his resignation and retirement to the university in writing via email (not a text message as claimed in your letter ). Later that same night at 9:42 PM, Wren Baker, the college athletic director, cc to me as general counsel, wrote back an email accepting Mr. Huggins’ resignation and retirement. Both parties have since reasonably relied on that resignation and notice of retirement in a number of ways. In addition, as of yesterday’s letter from Mr Campbell, 20 days have elapsed since Mr Huggins’ resignation and retirement, with no claim by Mr Huggins, or his other two lawyers, that he did indeed not step down and retire .
There’s clearly a lot to unravel here, with a possible lawsuit from the man who was one of West Virginia’s most recognizable faces for 16 years.
West Virginia was already trying to move on from Huggins, who left the program in disgrace following the scandal and DUI arrest, which was his second following an earlier one in 2004 when he was with Cincinnati. The school responded to the slur by suspending Huggins for three games and cutting his salary by $1 million.
Legally recognized or not, Huggins’ departure led to several transfers from West Virginia and an aborted search for his replacement. Instead, the school promoted assistant Josh Eilert to interim head coach and announced it would pursue a true successor after the 2023–24 season.
