Exonerated By IARP, Rick Pitino Is Now Free To Be Pursued By High-Major Schools

Rick Pitino enjoyed a banner day on Thursday, and there could be more such days ahead.

With his exoneration by the Independent Accountability Resolution Process (IARP) in the Louisville infractions case dating to 2017, Pitino now appears to be even more desirable as a coach at a high-major program going forward. He got no show case, no penalty, nothing.

“I bet if you polled all the coaches in college basketball and asked them who they would pick to coach in a one-game setting, over 50 percent would pick him,” one industry source.

Pitino, 70, is the only coach to lead two programs to NCAA championships (although the Louisville title from 2013 was vacated), and is one of three to lead five to the Big Dance, including Iona, where he currently coaches.

As I reported over on ZAGSBLOG last month, Pitino’s extension talks with Iona didn’t work out and instead Pitino has three years left on his current contract that pays him in the high-six-figure range and has no buyout. He recently hired Evan Daniels of CAA as his agent.

“I enjoy where I live,” he said Thursday on a Zoom call with his attorney, Steve Stapleton. “I’m part of the greatest state, the greatest city in the United States. I grew up seven streets from Madison Square Garden, where I had the great fortune of coaching the Knicks. I’m back home, I love the players. I’m coaching. It’s really about the players, it’s not about me. And I’m enjoying coaching the hell out of them.”

Pitino loves to coach and emphasized again how much he’s looking forward to Iona’s non-conference schedule that tips off Monday against Penn and includes games against New Mexico, coached by his son Richard Pitino, as well as Hofstra, Vermont, Santa Clara, Saint Bonaventure, Princeton and SMU. He has said the goal was to create a schedule capable of propelling Iona into the Big Dance with an at-large bid if they can’t win the MAAC Tournament.

In recent years Pitino has been linked to openings at Maryland, Indiana, UNLV and St. John’s. Imagine how desirable he’ll be if he leads the Gaels back to the NCAA Tournament, and on any kind of run?

“I want to coach for a long time, as long as my health stays the same,” he said last month. “I said I would love to finish my career at Iona but sometimes it just doesn’t work out. You just never know about the future. My intent is I love where I’m living, I love the school, I love my players even more than where I’m living and how much I love the school. You just never know.”

Pitino sure seemed to be having some fun Thursday after the IARP exonerated him in the Louisville saga where Adidas representatives agreed to funnel $100,000 to Brian Bowen, a Louisville commit, back in 2017. Louisville ended up dodging major punishments in the case and got no postseason ban. They were hit with a $5,000 fine, a small reduction in recruiting days and two years of probation. Both Pitino and ex-Louisville coach Chris Mack avoid punishment entirely.

“Additionally, the hearing panel determined no violation by former head coach No. 1 (Pitino) occurred given that he demonstrated he promoted an atmosphere of compliance,” the IARP findings read.

Two former Louisville assistants, Kenny Johnson (now at Rhode Island) and Jordan Fair, were hit with two-year show causes. (Johnson’s is limited and involves his ability to recruit on the road.)

Prosecutors in the first Adidas trial in the fall of 2018 said that Johnson gave $1,300 to Brian Bowen Sr. and that Fair gave $900 to a different recruit. Bowen Sr. testified that Johnson gave him $1,300 in cash on Aug. 23, 2017 to help defray his family’s rent at the Galt House in Louisville. Johnson has denied the claim.

The IARP ruled that “a former associate head coach (Johnson) furnished false and misleading information to the NCAA enforcement staff regarding an off-campus recruiting contact with a prospective student-athlete.”

During the trial, Adidas consultant T.J. Gassnola testified that he never discussed the Bowen payments with Pitino and that only four people knew. Pitino was not one of them.

“I didn’t,” Gassnola said then when asked if he said anything to Pitino about the Bowen deal.

Pressed on how he could not have known about the Bowen situation, Pitino said he “grilled” the family about the recruitment when he met them and ultimately decided Bowen had no other option than Louisville for basketball reasons. He said Arizona and Michigan State weren’t able to offer him playing time.

“Brian Bowen had no other options but to come at that time if he wanted to play at the major level,” Pitino said.

As for the pay-for-play scheme, Pitino said, “I still believe to this day that the mom and the young man had no idea that this was doing on.”

As for his relationship with Johnson, Pitino said he was “disappointed” in some of his actions, but wished him the best at Rhode Island.

“Certainly I did fail in not discovering what went on with some of my coaches, and they’ve got to live with that,” Pitino said. “And so do I.”

As for the strippers and hookers scandal that also occurred on his watch at Louisville, Pitino has long maintained he didn’t know about that, either, and that a rogue assistant, Andre McGee, was responsible.

“When you sneak people through an emergency door at midnight, you can’t possibly know about that,” Pitino said. “If I did, all hell would’ve broken loose.”

When pressed about why he didn’t learn about the scandal from parents, he cracked, “I didn’t ask [the parents], ‘Did you see any ladies of the night roaming around?’”

Pitino, who was fired by Louisville in 2017 after the scandals, said he was “disappointed” Louisville didn’t dig in its heels with the NCAA more like Kansas and North Carolina, which so far have escaped major punishment, although Kansas did self-impose sanctions Wednesday, including a four-game suspension for head coach Bill Self.

“Yes, I am very disappointed in that,” he said of Louisville’s failure to fight harder. “North Carolina really dug in their heels, Louisville did not.”

Pitino said he believes one day Louisville’s 2013 NCAA championship banner will fly again, although he has no plans to return to the school — unless they make amends with fired former AD Tom Jurich.

“I believe the NCAA will hang the banner,” he said, adding, “We all know that what went in in that dorm was reprehensible, but that should take away from the players and the pride we had in that championship…Those young men won a championship the honest way.”

Pitino said if “the IARP was involved in looking at that case, that banner would still be hanging today,” and ripped the NCAA for dealing with “hearsay” while he said the IARP relied on facts.

All in all, it was a good day for Rick Pitino.

And it certainly seemed to pave the way for high-major schools to come calling after this season.

After all, Sean Miller got hired at Xavier after being tinged with scandal at Arizona. Self is still employed at Kansas. Bruce Pearl got an extension at Auburn despite his past run-ins with the NCAA.

Consider that Pitino had 123 wins vacated from his time at Louisville and still has 684 career victories. He would have 807 if those wins still counted.

“Do I feel vindicated?” he asked rhetorically. “It’s really not that important anymore. My only salvation was that I learned so much by coaching in the Euroleague. I was so appreciative of that. And being back at Iona, is a great thrill for me and family.”

How long he stays remains to be seen.