MORGANTOWN, West Virginia — This past summer, West Virginia’s legendary former head coach Bob Huggins was Bob Huggins was arrested in Pittsburgh on a charge of driving under the influence after taking a breath tast that showed Huggins’ blood alcohol content to be 0.21%, which is more than twice the legal limit of 0.08% in Pennsylvania.
Huggins, 70, was forced to resign the following day and his legendary career came to a crashing end. Today, Huggins appeared on the Full Court Press Podcast, a weekly college basketball radio show focused on WVU basketball, and he opened up on several topics, including his arrrest. Here’s what Huggins had to say during the apperance:
What have you been up to lately?
“I’ve been up to a little bit of everything. Going fishing. Hanging out at my cabin. Just kicking back and relaxing.”
What happened the night of the DUI?
“It was a very unfortunate situation. I was at my brother’s basketball camp. I went up there to hang around with some coaches. My back was absolutely killing me and I wanted to go home. I called my doctor and he said to take my medication. I was going to come back home. I stopped to get a sandwich and a Coke. While I was eating, I decided to go back and hang out. I had a sandwich and some fries and I had a few drinks. I went left instead of going right because I didn’t want to go back to the restaurant because they were having a really good time, and I ended up in the middle of Pittsburgh with a Taylor Swift concert going on.
I thought I was well enough to drive. It’s an absolute lie when people say I didn’t know where I was. I don’t know the streets in Pittsburgh and there was a lot of people with the Taylor Swift concert. I knew I was in Pittsburgh and people saying that I thought I was in Columbus, Ohio is an outright lie. The people here at the university decided that I didn’t know where I was and that’s a lie.”
What does Huggins want the fans to know?
I felt terrible about it and I still feel terrible about it. I let down so many players and the fans and the state of West Virginia. I fully recognize that and take full responsibility for that. I didn’t really know what to do at that time. I went to rehab, I did that on my own, nobody told me to do that. I went to rehab because I thought that was the right thing to do and what I needed to do.
It’s been 142 days since I’ve had a drink. Rehab was good. You go in and you are surrounded by a lot of people and you start listening to what other people have been through and you start to think that you can get through this and get back to leading a life that you want to live. I grew up here and I love this state.
On resignation from WVU
We were sitting on the front porch and trying to talk to people about it. I want to coach. I want to coach our kids. I didn’t want to resign and not coach our kids. I want to stay here and I want to coach our kids. These guys were expecting for me to be their coach.
To tell the truth, the guy over at the athletic department convinced my wife that we would lose all of our benefits if I didn’t resign, which just isn’t true. My wife signed the resignation because she was convinced that she had to.
I felt like I deserved to sit down and talk to them. I would have told them that it was a terrible mistake and that it would never happen again. I never talked to anyone in the athletic department.
I think there are a lot of people at the university that believes that it could have been handled better than it was. It should have been handled a whole lot better than it was. It was a real knee jerk decision.
I don’t remember resigning. There were a lot of people trying to resign for me. I didn’t want to resign. I wanted to be able to sit down and talk to the people above me and find a way to work this out. I understand that I made a mistake, but I’ve also done a lot of good in the community and the state.”
