Will Wade fired after NCAA gives LSU Notice of Allegations | College Football Enquirer
Yahoo Sports’ Dan Wetzel and Sports Illustrated’s Pat Forde discuss Will Wade’s firing from LSU after the NCAA released its Notice of Allegations regarding paying players in connection with the FBI college basketball investigation.
Video Transcript
DAN WETZEL: Pat, thoughts on Will Wade, the Will Wade error coming to an end.
PAT FORDE: [LAUGHS]
DAN WETZEL: This guy made a lot of money spending a lot of money.
PAT FORDE: He did. He did. And boy, the NCAA notice of allegations-- sometimes these are underwhelming or a little bit too buried in wonkish terminology or something. Nuh-uh, not this one. It's a whopper. It is big-time.
It's not just the wiretap from the FBI and the strong-ass offer that, as you said, Dan-- you and I and Pete broke the story, like, March 8, 2019. It took till past then for him to get fired, for-- for three years for him to get fired for that, when everybody who listened to that-- every rational human being who doesn't want to lie to themselves or to anyone else said-- well, he's clearly buying a player. That's a fireable offense.
Oh, no. No, no, no, no, no. We're going to let this play out. We're going to make sure that we're fair. We're going to be patient. We're going to be thorough.
DAN WETZEL: Why? Why did they do that? Like, I get Bill Self. He's a good coach.
PAT FORDE: Right. [LAUGHS]
DAN WETZEL: Bill Self's a really good basketball coach, and they win tons of games, and they can win the National Championship.
PAT FORDE: Yeah.
DAN WETZEL: Will Wade?
PAT FORDE: Will Wade. They did go to the Sweet 16, but he was suspended. He wasn't even the coach when they went to the Sweet 16.
Look, I just think that the default position at LSU is, lie and deny. And we have seen that and again. My-- my favorite example of when the default position is, lie and deny, is when America watches Odell Beckham hand out hundreds on the field in the Louisiana Superdome, and they say it was fake money.
DAN WETZEL: [LAUGHS]
PAT FORDE: The official statement-- well, that was fake money. We're just going to lie. I mean, we're-- we're--
DAN WETZEL: They accused him of counterfeit-- of running a counterfeit operation.
PAT FORDE: Yes.
DAN WETZEL: They really did. Yeah, I don't know. I mean, totally ridiculous. I mean, we've been joking about this for years. This is one of my longest-- longest running bits.
PAT FORDE: [LAUGHS]. We do have to get some new material now.
DAN WETZEL: Yeah, that's true. It was like, wow-- if they're not going to fire-- [INAUDIBLE]
I don't know. I don't know what Will [INAUDIBLE].
PAT FORDE: The best part of the NOA was the text messages that they got that he tried to obstruct the investigation and keep from them. But between him and the ex-fiancé of an ex player, where she's shaking him down for money for car payments-- like, I'm going to blow the whistle on you paying everybody, but I need you to pay for my car.
DAN WETZEL: [LAUGHS]
PAT FORDE: OK, I'll pay you. And then he does it again. And then she's, like, coming back again, and he's like, I thought we were done here. She's like, oh, no. No, we're never done here, Will.
DAN WETZEL: No, that's-- that's how blackmail works. Never done. Now you're in trouble for paying the blackmail. You just made it worse. Yeah, I mean, at least Rick Pitino came to his senses to say-- [LAUGHS]
This is going-- this whole woman at the Italian restaurant thing is going to absolutely humiliate me forever, but I ain't losing my money on this.
PAT FORDE: Right, I'll just go to the FBI.
DAN WETZEL: Yeah, he was paying someone off to keep quiet about the payoffs.
PAT FORDE: The other whopper out of the-- the allegations was that, for, like, six months in 2020, he and the assistant coach were handing out money to players, allegedly. That's-- 2020-- that's a year after he's been under the microscope, and that tells you what LSU's strong-ass deterrence did. It's pretty unbelievable to get fired with a tournament team the day before the selection show.