At a news conference this afternoon on the USF campus, President Judy Genshaft confirmed that that the school had fired the only coach its Division I football program has ever had, Jim Leavitt.
In her brief address to reporters, Genshaft said,
"Sadly, at the end of his tenure at USF, Coach Leavitt committed serious
violations of our standards of conduct. A thorough, fair and professional review
conducted by internal and external reviewers over the past three weeks led the
university to decide that USF should now seek a new head coach"
An investigation completed this week said that Leavitt had grabbed one of his players by the throat, slapped him in the face with an open hand, and then lied about it.
Leavitt is denying the report.
That player, as originally reported on the Web site Fanhouse on December 14th, was Sophomore walk on Joel Miller. The Web site reported that Leavitt had grabbed Miller by the throat and him twice in the face at halftime of the November 21 game against Louisville.
In the three page letter written to Leavitt by Athletic Director Doug Woolard explaining why he was being canned, Woolard writes:
