Louisville on Friday suspended six games for male basketball coach Chris Mack after concluding that he did not follow college guidelines and procedures while being extorted by an assistant former coach.
Louisville said in a statement that Mack would be suspended without pay from Nov. 8-27 and would miss six games that did not belong to ACC, including two games in the Bahamas. During the suspension, Mack will be banned from having contact with players and coaches. According to the school, he will lose compensation of about $ 221,000.
“As I have said since the beginning of my term, we have high expectations for all of our staff and coaches and hold people accountable for their actions,” Cardinals athletics director Vince Tyra said in a statement. “Although we have made great strides in the last four years to change the culture of our athletics department, we cannot afford to have any setbacks, no matter how big or small, in our activities. I trust that Coach Mack now understands the impact of his actions. We are all confident that he will move forward. “
In May, the U.S. District Attorney for the Western District of Kentucky charged former basketball assistant Dino Gaudio with a federal charge of attempting to extort money and other valuables from the university.
According to the indictment, Gaudio, during a face-to-face meeting with Louisville officials on March 17, “threatened to denounce to the media the allegations that the University of Louisville men’s basketball program had violated [NCAA] rules in the production of recruitment videos for future student-athletes and in their use of postgraduate assistants in practice, unless the University of Louisville pays [Gaudio] his salary for an additional 17 months or provided the amount equivalent to 17 months’ salary. “
Later that day, according to the charge, Gaudio “sent a text message to University of Louisville staff that contained one of the recruitment videos he threatened to send to the media.” According to the government, the text message was traveling outside of Kentucky.
On June 4, Gaudio, 64, pleaded guilty to an interstate communications charge with intent to extort. As part of an agreement with prosecutors, he was sentenced on Friday to one year of probation and a $ 10,000 fine.
“I regret that any of my involuntary actions or failures to follow the guidelines of the University have unnecessarily attracted our excellent athletics programs and the University,” Mack said in a statement. “I understand that I could have treated things differently and therefore I accept this suspension. While it will kill me to be out of our basketball family in November, I will do my best to prepare them for success before and after. out of my time, and I am fully confident that our coaches, staff and student-athletes will live up to it ”.