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Suspended Louisville coach Rick Pitino: ‘I’ll be vindicated’

NCAA Basketball Tournament - Second Round - Michigan v Louisville

INDIANAPOLIS, IN - MARCH 19: Head coach Rick Pitino of the Louisville Cardinals reacts to their 69-73 loss to the Michigan Wolverines during the second round of the 2017 NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament at the Bankers Life Fieldhouse on March 19, 2017 in Indianapolis, Indiana. (Photo by Joe Robbins/Getty Images)

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Speaking publicly for the first time since he was effectively fired as the head coach of the Louisville Cardinals, Rick Pitino told the Louisville Courier-Journal that he returned to Miami, is selling his house in Kentucky and is “laying low”, vowing that his name will be cleared by the time the dust settles on the corruption scandal that has rocked college basketball.

Pitino is reportedly ‘Coach-2' in the FBI complaint, who is alleged to have spoken to Adidas executive Jim Gatto three times in the days leading up to the agreement to facilitate a $100,000 payment from Adidas to Brian Bowen. Coach-2 is also referenced in a conversation with one of the Louisville assistants and an AAU coach that was one of the ten people arrested last week, saying “all [Pitino] has to do is pick up the phone and call, and they’re taking care of us.”

When asked whether or not he is Coach-2 in the complaint, he told the paper “doesn’t matter if I am or not” and that he has "[zero] to do with it and I’ll be vindicated.”