It's been a terrible weekend for everyone in college football, and an especially terrible one in Fort Collins, Colorado.
The university administration has paused all football activity and launched an investigation into an allegedly toxic culture inside the program. Implicated among those allegations are former head coach Mike Bobo.
"Under Bobo and (former defensive coordinator) John Jancek, it was like an angry white man society and they come into college football to take it out on the players,'' Brandon Summer, a backup punter under Bobo, told the Coloradoan. "They were racially insensitive but players were concerned about their scholarships and playing time, so many didn't say anything and that's not right.''
The report mentioned a specific instance when Bobo wanted a Black woman to meet with a Black recruit.
In a meeting with his assistant coaches, it was confirmed that Bobo was wanting a Black woman to meet a Black recruit. He looked at former assistant coach Joe Cox, who is white and is married to a Black woman, and asked if his wife could meet the recruit. Cox said his wife was not available. He looked around the room and said to former assistant coach Bryan Applewhite, who is Black and married to a white woman, that the next time he hires a Black assistant coach he will make sure he has a Black wife.
However, the paper obtained an email written to a CSU staffer by Applewhite that said this:
"I never once witnessed or saw any racially insensitive gestures or comments from Mike Bobo towards a staff member or player."
On Sunday, a number of Bobo's former colleagues and players defended his character on Twitter.
Joe Cox, a former player of Bobo's and an assistant under him at Colorado State and now South Carolina, directly refuted the report.
Many others came forward as well.
Bobo is now the offensive coordinator at South Carolina. The school said this to The State in South Carolina:
“We are aware of the allegations made against Mike Bobo while he was the head coach at Colorado State University. While there have been no such complaints made against Coach Bobo during his time at South Carolina, we are in the process of doing our due diligence and have already been in contact with the administration at Colorado State and with Coach Bobo to gain more information and to determine the facts.”
Gamecocks head coach Will Muschamp has not released a specific statement on Bobo -- the pair have known each other nearly 30 years, dating back to their time as Georgia teammates in the early 1990s -- but a quick scroll through his Twitter feed shows he stands behind the character of his new offensive coordinator.