With head coach Urban Meyer on paid administrative leave and wide receivers coach Zach Smith long terminated for domestic abuse allegations, one question has seemed to consume Ohio State football fans: Who knew about the allegations at Ohio State and when did they know? Smith appeared on 105.7 the Zone in Columbus on Friday evening and said Ohio State athletic director Gene Smith was aware of the 2015 allegations. “I found out about the allegation [in October 2015] because I was out recruiting on a bye week. Gene Smith called me and said your ex-wife is accusing of you abuse,” Smith told host Matt McCoy. “He said I had to be on the next flight home [from an open week recruiting trip]” RELATED Urban Meyer Says He Reported 2015 Zach Smith Incident When pressed, Zach Smith said he believes the police notified the university. “I don't know this for a fact, but I believe the Powell Police Department contacted Ohio State—not Urban, but the university.”<doc-sep>Thank you for reading! Please purchase a subscription to read our premium content. If you have a subscription, please log in or sign up for an account on our website to continue.<doc-sep>In a bizarre, twisting and probably not particularly helpful Friday afternoon, both Ohio State head coach Urban Meyer and former wide receivers coach Zach Smith broke their silence on the scandal that left Smith fired, Meyer on administrative leave and the Buckeyes’ program hanging in the balance. Some questions were answered. Many more were created. One critical one remains: Why in the world did Urban Meyer, OSU athletic director Gene Smith or anyone else with knowledge of the situation think it was a good and proper idea to keep Zach Smith employed and fully supported the past three years, even after Zach was accused in 2015 of domestic assault against his ex-wife Courtney? Start quickly with Meyer, who in a statement revealed he actually did know about Courtney’s 2015 allegation. He claims he, like always, had “followed proper reporting protocols and procedures.” This runs completely contrary to his statements last month at Big Ten media day when Meyer claimed he had no knowledge of the 2015 allegation and had never had a conversation about it. He is now intimating otherwise. Meyer said he “failed” to accurately answer questions from the media about the subject because he wasn’t prepared and was “caught off-guard.” Meyer had just, days prior, fired Zach Smith after the assistant violated a separate protective order placed on him by Courtney. As such, it’s confusing why Meyer wouldn’t be prepared or offer firmer clarification on the hot-button subject, let alone why he didn’t get it right in any of the nine separate questions on the topic he was asked during multiple sessions with the media. Urban Meyer was place on paid administrative leave by Ohio State on Wednesday afternoon. (Getty) Still, if it’s true Meyer reported what he needed to report, then it becomes more difficult for Ohio State to fire him for cause. The Joe Paterno model of doing what he was supposed to do could save him some $40 million in owed money if the school wants to move on anyway. If he got out of the way and let Gene Smith or others at the university handle it, as he’s required, then at least he wasn’t covering it up. Story continues That doesn’t change this incredibly troubling dynamic. Smith, 33, was twice accused by Courtney and once arrested (in 2009) of domestic abuse, and Meyer still had no problem keeping him on the staff. This despite the existence of photos showing injuries and bruises. Zach Smith, in an interview with 105.7 The Zone in Columbus, didn’t deny he was part of a troubled marriage or that things didn’t get physical or that those bruises could have been inflicted by him. He just claimed he never “broke the law.” “We had a volatile relationship, it was toxic,” Smith said. “There was a lot of aggressive situations … I’ve never committed domestic abuse against her. Now, there were times things got out of hand and I had to defensively restrain her … I never hit her.” What about the 2009 felony charge of abusing that Courtney later dropped? “I got arrested in 2009, mainly because the situation was, kind of, an argument gone bad,” Zach Smith told the radio station. “I got arrested simply because it was 3 in the morning. [The police said], ‘We have to bring you in because we can’t leave you here’ … they took me in and they arrested me and the charges got dropped after the investigation.” The bruises in the photos Courtney Smith shared earlier this week? “I am not discounting they are [from me], I don’t know when they are from, I don’t know where they are from,” Zach said. “There were several times that things got out of hand between us and I can’t say [I may have been] restraining her to get out of the house. I’m not saying she didn’t get a bruise or a mark.” On a question about whether he ever stalked her or threatened her via text message. “I’ve made mistakes,” Zach Smith said. “I was still in love with her. … I don’t believe I ever threatened her. … No one did anything illegal, this should have stayed behind closed doors because now my kids have to deal with it.” Perhaps only Zach and Courtney Smith know for sure what happened between the two of them. The rest of us are in no position to claim full knowledge. However, there is nothing Zach Smith said in an interview – an interview that he, and his attorney, had days to prepare for – that didn’t sound like he very well could be guilty of domestic abuse. Some of his lines and some of his excuses are textbook. His stories were chilling. He rambled and tried to walk some excessively thin line, at least in his mind. He apparently forgot about a text-message exchange with Courtney where she stated, “think back to the cheating the lies and picking me up by my neck strangling me in Punta Cana and at our place in April …” “I know!!! … I’m so so sorry!! !” Zach responded. Zach Smith was fired from the Ohio State football staff last month. (AP) He seemed most upset Courtney spoke of the confrontations outside of their relationship, a pathetic mindset out of the 1950s, if that. “I believe personal matters, marital matters need to remain personal and between a husband and wife,” Zach said on ESPN in a separate interview. If this is how he talks in a prepared interview on national television, then what’s he like behind closed doors? Is it any surprise Shelley Meyer, Urban’s wife, said in a text to Courtney Smith that Zach Smith scares her? Maybe he’s 100 percent innocent. But how in the world did Urban Meyer and Gene Smith, who Zach Smith says ordered him back to campus from a recruiting trip to discuss Courtney’s allegations, decide they were 100 percent sure of that, so 100 percent sure he deserved to remain on the Buckeyes’ staff?<doc-sep>Gene Smith, your move? Actually, the respected Ohio State athletic director has our sympathy after a confusing, confounding media tour put on late Friday by his coach and a former assistant. You thought paid administrative leave was bad? Or an ugly divorce with allegations of abuse? Smith now has to sift through a growing scandal that has become metastatic. Disgraced former wide receivers coach Zach Smith asked us to believe the neck of his ex-wife ran right into his hands. "Defensive action [by me]," he labeled the bruises and battering as depicted in Facebook photos posted by college football reporter Brett McMurphy on behalf of Zach's ex-wife Courtney. At about the same time, Gene Smith's disgraced coach, Urban Meyer, released a statement saying he followed "proper reporting protocols" regarding a 2015 domestic incident involving Zach Smith and Courtney. That was in direct conflict to what he told reporters 10 days ago at the 2018 Big Ten Media Days. "There was nothing," Meyer said that day of Zach Smith's alleged battering of Courtney from three years ago. Meyer didn't stop there. He went on to disparage the actual reporting of the incident by McMurphy. "I don't know who creates a story like that," Meyer said. For the record, that's going from "nothing" to I-did-everything-by-the-book-and-reported-whatever-there-was-to-report-to-my-boss in a span of just over a week. One quick question: What exactly is proper protocol? One quicker question: By saying that, did Meyer just throw his AD under the bus suggesting his boss somehow didn't act properly? This is a man in Gene Smith who deftly handles one of the largest athletic enterprises in the country. But if he has to fire Meyer, it would be the second such Buckeyes football coach to get The Big Haircut in Columbus, Ohio, since 2011. Remember Jim Tressel? This, then, is beginning to be a trend. What we have now is a sordid scandal taken to the next insidious level. The main participants have chosen to wage war through the media. The only innocent seems to be Courtney Smith, whose bravery continues to shine through this mess. Meanwhile, in the statement Meyer provided via his Twitter account, the coach defended himself with or without the consent of his employers while on paid administrative leave during an ongoing investigation. (Hint: There was probably no consent from Ohio State. It probably wants these sort of questions answered to their faces in private across a fine burnished oak conference table with lawyers present.) Back to poor Gene Smith. The dual media tours by Meyer and Zach Smith did seem to indicate the AD had been told everything in 2015. Zach told ESPN he was summoned to discuss "this felonious domestic assault accusation" in 2015 by Gene. He also said Meyer discussed the incident with him that year -- confirming Meyer knew about it three years ago as opposed to just days ago as he originally claimed -- and threatened to fire him if he was found to have hit his wife. Should the university have followed up despite Zach not being charged? "That's not their job. Their job is not to call someone who is accusing another person of something," Zach said. Meyer's essentially changed his story in saying he reported the 2015 incident up the chain of command. Let's take a knee here for a second. A man who largely invented the modern spread offense said in Friday's statement he was "not adequately prepared to discuss these sensitive personnel issues." Feel free to choose your version of the truth. Lying to the media in a Chicago hotel ballroom isn't necessarily a fireable offense. But those ballroom doors don't shut Meyer in. His words conveyed through the media were sent to millions of people, including Ohio State fans, regents and administrators, coaching peers, the Big Ten conference and college athletics as a whole. Whatever Meyer spouts, he says to the world. Meanwhile, Zach lamely defended himself and whatever happened within his tumultuous marriage. "We had a toxic relationship, volatile relationship," he told ESPN. "We definitely needed to split up. We needed to divorce." But did he hit his wife? Absolutely not, Smith countered. That despite bruises around his wife's neck and a bloody hand appearing on Facebook, which he claimed were a result of defensive restraint. And even if Zach did hit her, hey, it's nobody's business but theirs. "No one did anything illegal," he said. "This should stay behind closed doors so my kids don't have to see it." Because it stayed behind closed doors, Zach, is why we're having this conversation. The marital-problems-are-private argument doesn't make sense either. You're a highly-paid state employee whose actions -- as they affect the taxpayers who fund your salary -- absolutely deserve scrutiny. Smith's never-laid-a-hand-on-her claim took a direct hit in real time on Twitter. As Smith was defending himself Friday, McMurphy tweeted a screenshot of a text message conversation. It appeared to show Smith admitting he strangled his wife while on vacation. Where do we go from here? Hopefully to a higher moral ground. One thing is for sure: The school's investigators have been given one hell of a head start. They have a lot of reading material to catch up on.<doc-sep>
COLUMBUS, Ohio -- Fired Ohio State assistant coach Zach Smith said in a radio interview with 105.7 The Zone in Columbus on Friday evening that he never committed domestic abuse against his ex-wife Courtney. "There were a lot of aggressive situations," Smith said in a 15-minute interview with Matt McCoy and Stanley Jackson. "The only thing that is absolutely true is that I never committed domestic abuse against her. There were times things got out of hand and I had to defensively kind of restrain her and move her and get out of the situation and go sleep at the office and try to remove myself. That absolutely happened." Courtney Smith told reporter Brett McMurphy in a story published Wednesday that she was abused on multiple occasions by her husband. In 2015, there were two incidents of alleged abuse that police in Powell investigated. No charges of domestic violence have been filed against Zach Smith. "He was emotionally and physically abusing," Courtney Smith told McMurphy of her ex-husband. "Pushing me against the wall, putting his hands around my throat. There were so many instances. It's hard to recall all of them." McMurphy also responded to Smith's interviews - he also spoke to ESPN - by posting a text message he said was from Courtney Smith to Zach Smith and referenced another instant of physical abuse. Zach Smith told @1057TheZone he never abused Courtney. Here is text message b/w Zach & Courtney when he admits & apologizes for strangling his wife on Punta Cana trip in March 2015 & again in April pic.twitter.com/GjcjWh6mFT — Brett McMurphy (@Brett_McMurphy) August 3, 2018 Zach Smith also said that not only did Urban Meyer know about the allegations in 2015, but Ohio State athletic director Gene Smith knew as well. Courtney Smith told McMurphy that she told Shelley Meyer, Urban Meyer's wife, that she was being abused by Zach. Urban Meyer denied last week that he knew about any 2015 domestic abuse situations. But on Friday, just before Zach Smith's radio interview served as Smith's first public comments, Meyer made his first public comments since last week in a statement on Twitter. He said he did know about the 2015 incidents and reported that to Ohio State. "Plenty of people knew about the allegation," Zach Smith. Zach Smith said he was recruiting away from Columbus during Ohio State's bye week in the last week of October in 2015, when Ohio State athletic director Gene Smith called him and told him to come back to Columbus because of the domestic abuse allegation. "I think they handled it exactly how they should have handled it," Zach Smith said of Ohio State. The Powell police alerted Ohio State about the abuse allegations, according to Zach Smith. He said the police investigated, and after there were no charges, "the case went away." Smith said several times, when pressed by McCoy and Jackson, that none of those incidents were him abusing his wife. "There was never domestic abuse," Smith said. "I never hit her, I never got arrested, never got charged, I got investigated twice, and no charges came about because I didn't do anything physically to harm her." McMurphy's report included several photos from Courtney Smith showing injuries she alleged were inflicted by her husband. They include a large bruise on her upper arm, another on her elbow and a bloody cut on her hand. Asked again to explain those photos, Zach Smith said, "there were several times things got out of hand between us. And I'm not saying that as I restrained her and moved her out of my way to exit the house and get out of volatile situation, I'm not saying it's not possible she got a bruise or a mark. But I don't know what each picture's from. So I don't know." Zach Smith said he doesn't believe he deserved to be fired, but he understood why he was. He believes the media coverage of the allegations against him were too much for Ohio State to handle. "It was a move they had to make," Zach Smith said. "I don't think I deserved it, but I don't think it was wrong."