Rick Pitino says he will evaulate his future plans after the season, but that he doesn’t think he “can live a day without coaching.”
Louisville imposed a postseason ban and will play its last regular-season home game Tuesday night against Georgia Tech before closing out the season on Saturday at Virginia.
“I’ll ask myself after the season if Louisville is a better place with Rick Pitino as coach, and if the answer is yes, I’ll do what I’ve done for 15 years and come back and fight for a championship, and that’s what I plan on doing,” the embattled coach told Ian O’Connor in this ESPN.com column. “But if the time comes that I feel Louisville is better off without me, I’m without ego now. I’d recommend this job to everybody. The town is great, the AD is off-the-charts fantastic and loyal, and I have a super team coming back. But if I think Louisville will be better off without me, anything’s possible.”
He added: “I don’t think I can live a day without coaching; it’s in my blood.”
The Hall of Fame coach has 10 years and a reported $50 million left on his contract at Louisville, but has now survived two sex scandals at Louisville, although he maintains he had no knowledge of former staffer Andre McGee allegedly paying women to dance for and have sex with recruits, their fathers and Louisville players.
“Fortunately I’m innocent of all wrongdoing, I run a clean program, and I go overboard on being compliant,” he told O’Connor. “And unfortunately this happened because of a young man who I gave a break to every step along the way in life. That being said, I can understand anybody’s opinion when it first broke that, how could nobody know? How it happened I’ll never know, but it’s a part of my life and something I have to live with. When all is said and done, everybody will see how I run a program.”
Pitino, 63, has been linked to the UNLV job and has also expressed interest in returning to the NBA, according to O’Connor.
“He’s definitely not done in coaching, and I don’t see him leaving Louisville,” Syracuse coach Jim Boeheim said. “They’ll get through this like we had to get through it. Get it resolved as quickly as possible, and move on from there. They’re always going to have good players, and if Rick Pitino has good players, he’s going to win.”
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