Global Courant
West Virginia basketball coach Bob Huggins has resigned a day after his arrest on suspicion of drunk driving in the latest incident in a Hall of Fame career that quickly imploded.
The university announced the resignation on Saturday evening. It came a month after the university suspended him for three games for using an anti-gay slur during a radio interview while belittling Catholics.
The 69-year-old Huggins leaves as the third-winning coach of all time in Division I with 935 career wins, behind only Duke’s Mike Krzyzewski (1,202) and Syracuse’s Jim Boeheim (998), both of whom are retired. Unlike the others, Huggins had no national titles, taking Cincinnati to the Final Four in 1992 and West Virginia in 2010.
Huggins had 16-year stints each with the Bearcats and Mountaineers. Both ended in the wake of drunk driving arrests.
Huggins was charged with drunk driving Friday night after his SUV came to a stop in the middle of traffic in Pittsburgh with a torn tire and the driver’s side door left open at around 8:30 p.m. Huggins’ blood alcohol content was more than twice the legal limit.
Huggins was charged with drunk driving, was released and will appear for a preliminary hearing at a later date, according to a police report.
In a statement to the West Virginia community on Saturday night, Huggins said, “Today I have submitted a letter to President Gordon Gee and Vice President and Director of Athletics Wren Baker informing them of my resignation and intent to retire. to serve as head men’s basketball coach at West Virginia University effective immediately.”
In a separate statement Saturday night, the West Virginia Athletic Department said they accepted the resignation “in light of recent events.
“We support his decision so he can focus on his health and his family. On behalf of West Virginia University, we share our appreciation for his service to our university, our community and our state.”
A replacement for Huggins was not immediately named. The statement from the athletic department said that “we will focus in the coming days on supporting the student-athletes in our men’s basketball program and strengthening leadership for our program.”
Huggins said his recent actions do not represent the university’s values or the leadership expected in his role as a coach.
“While I have always tried to represent our university with honor, I have failed all of you – and myself –,” he said. “I am solely responsible for my conduct and I sincerely apologize to the University community, especially the student-athletes, coaches and staff of our program. I need to do better and I plan to focus on my health and my family in the coming months so I can be the person they deserve.”
Huggins added that it was “the honor of my professional career” to lead the team at his alma mater. Born in Morgantown, he said it “will always be my home, and I will always be a rock climber. Thanks to everyone who has supported our program over the years. It has meant more to me and my family than you could ever know.
On Friday night, officers ordered Huggins to pull off the road so they could help with the tire, then activated their lights when they saw Huggins having trouble maneuvering the SUV to allow vehicles to pass. When questioned, officers suspected he was intoxicated and asked him to get out of the vehicle. According to the report, he failed standard sobriety tests in the field, was taken into custody without incident and transported for further testing.
It was Huggins’ second such arrest. The other took place in 2004 when he was head coach at Cincinnati.
In June 2004, Huggins pleaded no drink driving in a Cincinnati suburb and was ordered to attend a three-day intervention program. The University of Cincinnati suspended him indefinitely with pay and told Huggins to rehabilitate.
Huggins was allowed back to work two months later and said: “I made a terrible mistake and what bothers me the most is that I hurt other people. All I can do is work hard to become a better person, a better coach, become better at everything I do and make those people proud of me.”
By 2005, Huggins’ Cincinnati career was over; he was fired amid a power struggle with the school’s president and the aftermath of the 2004 arrest.
After spending a season at Kansas State, Huggins took his dream job at West Virginia, his alma mater, in 2007.
Last month, Huggins agreed to a three-game suspension, a $1 million salary cut and sensitivity training for using the slur during an interview with Cincinnati radio station WLW. Huggins was asked about the transfer portal and if he had any chance of bringing a player from Xavier, a Jesuit high school, to West Virginia.
“Catholics don’t do that,” Huggins said. “I’ll tell you what, any school that can throw rubber penises on the floor and then say they didn’t do it, by God they can get away with anything.
“It was the Crosstown Shootout. What it was, all those (expletives), those Catholic (expletives), I guess.”
In a joint statement later that week, Gee and Baker said the university had “made it explicitly clear to Coach Huggins that incidents of similar derogatory and offensive language will result in immediate termination.”
Huggins’ salary of $4.15 million was cut by $1 million after the insult. That discount would be used to directly support WVU’s LGBTQ+ center, as well as a college mental health center and other groups that support marginalized communities. At the time, he was suspended for the first three games of the 2023-2024 season. In addition, his contract was changed from a multi-year deal to a year-on-year deal, effective May 10.
Huggins was inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame last September. In 41 seasons, his teams have gone to 25 NCAA tournaments, finished in the top 10 of The Associated Press poll seven times and finished under .500 five times. The Mountaineers have 11 NCAA Tournament appearances under Huggins.
Huggins had assembled a solid group from the transfer portal for next season, including Syracuse center Jesse Edwards, Arizona guard Kerr Kriisa, Manhattan guards Jose Perez and Omar Silverio, and Montana State guard RaeQuan Battle.
“Man.. I knew the dude for 3 months but felt like forever,” Kriisa said on Twitter Saturday night. “So grateful that you really believe in me and take me as part of your family forever. I love your coach.”
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