Ex-Baylor coach tried to cover up payments

For those of you who have followed the Baylor University situation with the murder of Patrick Dennehey and the resignation of some coaches, here is the latest. We need to remember to pray for the Baylor leadership.

Ex-Baylor coach tried to cover up payments to Dennehy
10:56 PM CDT on Friday, August 15, 2003
By LEE HANCOCK and JEFF MILLER / The Dallas Morning News

Former Baylor basketball coach Dave Bliss tried to cover up illicit tuition payments to slain player Patrick Dennehy by asking teammates and assistant coaches to lie to investigators and claim Mr. Dennehy got the money by selling drugs, according to top university officials.

Investigators looking into abuses in the basketball program learned of the coverup scheme on Friday from a recently hired assistant coach who secretly taped meetings held by Mr. Bliss at the Ferrell Center the week before he resigned Aug. 8.

Mr. Bliss told The Dallas Morning News in an interview Friday night that he acknowledges the coverup attempt and is deeply regretful.

“I feel terrible about this entire ordeal,” he said. “It was definitely wrong, and as of last Friday, I’ve dealt only with the truth.

“Since then, I’ve cooperated with the inquiry committee completely.”

University President Robert Sloan expressed anger at the revelations.

“I am incensed and outraged by what I have heard today,” he said in a statement. “We entrusted the integrity of our basketball program to Coach Bliss. I was already angry about the facts uncovered by the investigative committee. Now I feel betrayed by this attempt by our former basketball coach to suppress and conceal the truth.”

The assistant, Abar Rouse, could not be reached Friday night.

Officials said they had no evidence that Mr. Dennehy was involved in drug peddling.

Baylor law professor Bill Underwood, head of the internal review committee, said Mr. Rouse turned over recordings and other “highly disturbing’’ evidence of the lengths that Coach Bliss was willing to go to try to save himself. He said the coach wrote out scripts that assistants and players could recite to try to convince investigators their dead teammate was a drug dealer.

“It’s hard to imagine that one individual can to such damage to an institution, and it’s terribly disappointing,’’ Mr. Underwood said.

Complete article: Dallas Morning News