UPDATE: On Wednesday evening the board of trustees fired Coach Joe Paterno along with Penn State president Graham Spanier.
UPDATE: Joe Paterno is retiring as the football coach at Penn State amid the sex abuse scandal.
ORIGINAL:
It’s safe to say Joe Paterno has had better weeks.
The Penn State icon was met at his doorstep Tuesday afternoon by a swarm of television cameras and reporters pelting him with questions regarding his future at the University following an alleged cover-up of a child sex-abuse scandal involving former Nittany Lion assistant (and one time Paterno heir apparent) Jerry Sandusky which first broke over the weekend.
“The word that keeps coming back to my mind is surreal,” CBS Sports college football insider Bruce Feldman told Brad Cesmat on “Big Guy on Sports” Tuesday. “Joe Paterno is one of the few active legends in sports. He’s the most powerful man in that town. I just don’t get how people in positions of leadership on a college campus can’t be discussed and disgraced by what they allowed to happen.”
Bruce Feldman on ‘Big Guy on Sports’
Tuesday morning Penn State officials announced Paterno would only answer football questions relating to their match-up this weekend with 19th-ranked Nebraska at his weekly press conference. The event was cancelled shortly there after.
The Nittany Lions afternoon practice was closed to the media.
So will Paterno be on the sideline coaching Saturday’s game against the Huskers?
“You’re getting mixed messages,” Feldman explained to Cesmat. “One of his sons Scott Paterno who is an attorney…said he is going to coach this weekend. I don’t know at this point what to believe. The one thing I’ll say is Penn State…the institution, has lost the benefit of the doubt in a big way.”
So for now we, like JoePa, will wait to see what what his future holds.
Paterno has won a Division I record 409 games in State Park, including two national championships. He constantly preaches success in the classroom, as well as the playing field. The Penn State Library is named for Paterno and his wife Sue.
