This week has had something new every day for fans of LSU Athletics.
Interim Athletic Director Verge Ausberry and Board of Supervisors members John Carmouche and Scott Ballard held a press conference on Friday to answer questions on recent personnel changes and clarify all the moving parts of the last week.
On Sunday, LSU announced it had fired head coach Brian Kelly, and then late Thursday night LSU announced they had agreed to part ways with athletic director Scott Woodward.
“Scott and LSU had a mutual agreement after conversations… nothing’s off the table of why Scott and LSU had a mutual agreement, but after those conversations they mutually agreed that it was a good idea,” Ballard said. “It wasn’t an LSU thing, it wasn’t a Scott thing.”
Woodward has seen seven national championships during his six-year tenure in Baton Rouge.
When asked about that success, Carmouche repeated that there was mutual agreement to part ways.
Amidst all of this, LSU has been brought further into the headlines because of Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry’s involvement and outspokenness in the contract negotiations after the firing of Brian Kelly, leaving many fans to question his involvement with the decision to let go of Woodward.
Landry publicly said Woodward wouldn’t be hiring the next LSU coach at an unrelated press conference Wednesday and complained about Kelly’s buyout. He said he was “tired of rewarding failure in this country and leaving taxpayers to foot the bill.”
Speakers at the press conference clarified Landry’s involvement in the move to oust Woodward and also said no public money will go toward Kelly’s buyout.
“The governor was not involved,” Carmouche said about LSU’s decision to part ways with Woodward. “The governor had a right to be concerned. But let me make it clear, the state has never, and the taxpayers have never paid for a coach and never will.”
The board was then asked where the money to pay Woodward’s buyout would come from. Ballard said it’ll all be “self-generated athletic funds and/or private donations.”
Ausberry said the search for the next head coach is already underway and a search committee has been formed.
Ausberry said the committee will consist of himself, Carmouche (the Board of Supervisors athletic committee chairman), former LSU football player and donor Ben Bordelon and Our Lady of the Lakes President and CEO EJ Kuiper. He said a fifth member yet to be named could be added.
Landry has also made it clear he’s against shelling out big guaranteed money for the next coach and said he’d rather “put metrics on it,” referring to an incentives-based compensation. However, the market as it’s set for college football coaches is primarily based on large, multi-year deals like the one Kelly signed to come to LSU.
Ausberry said Friday that the Board of Supervisors has authorized him to “get the best football coach there is” and do “whatever it takes to get that person here.”
Ballard also said the new university president, which will be named Tuesday, will “have input” in the search for the coach.
In 2020, Ausberry was implicated in the university’s Title IX scandal in athletics when he didn’t report a football player’s confession to domestic violence to the Title IX office or to law enforcement. As a result, he was later suspended and stepped down from the school’s presidential search committee at the time.
