Utah State athletic director Diana Sabau stood by the Title IX investigation that she said led to the firing of football coach Blake Anderson and several athletics staffers this month.
She also insisted on Friday that she had no “agenda” to clean house when moving to dismiss Anderson and associate athletic directors Jerry Bovee and Amy Crosbie like some, including Anderson’s attorney, Tom Mars, have alleged.
“This independent investigation was commissioned before I was hired as an athletic director,” Sabau told The Salt Lake Tribune. “So these events happened in April. The independent investigation was commissioned in July of 2023. And then I came to campus and was hired in August [of 2023].”
“So I learned about this investigation after I was hired,” she continued. “So for people to think that, or to allege that this is [for] an agenda, or it was conducted to move people along, is false. And that timeline can show them. That timeline is indicative of that.”
Anderson was fired in early July for violating Title IX reporting policies following a Title IX investigation conducted by Kansas City-based law firm Husch Blackwell. The firm concluded that Anderson conducted his own investigation following an alleged domestic violence case involving a football player instead of properly reporting it. He also delayed the suspension of the player, the investigation found.
(Steve Conner | AP) Utah State head coach Blake Anderson looks up at a videoboard late in second half of the Famous Idaho Potato Bowl, Saturday, Dec. 23, 2023, in Boise, Idaho.
Bovee, who was the interim athletic director at the time, was also fired for “violations of university policies related to the reporting of sexual and domestic violence.”
Since then, Anderson’s attorney has called the investigation a “sham.” He said Anderson followed every guidance.
Bovee has also contended that he reported the information “within 24 hours of hearing about it, as is required according to school policy.”
On Friday, Sabau stood by the investigation.
“Because of the findings in this investigation, actions had to take place,” she said. “And we’re going stand by those actions every single day, because it will make our culture better. It’ll make Utah State stronger.”
Sabau did not comment on Bovee’s specific grievances, however.
“Because there [are] current employment practices happening, their fair process has to play out. And I can’t comment on any of that,” she said.
The Utah State athletic director said she initially found out about the Title IX investigation after she was hired on Aug. 7, 2023, saying that the school’s general counsel was the one to tell her.
“I was not informed of the investigation during the interview process, or during my hiring,” she said. “It was a whirlwind when I came on campus.”
“I was pulled aside and told about the investigation shortly after arriving in Logan,” she continued. “For me, in all of my training within athletics, when you know that an investigation is happening, it’s hands off. Like that investigation happens independently. And it was by an outside firm. And I wasn’t kept up to date. I wasn’t informed. I just knew when the results and the findings were presented to the university, I would be informed of them. And that’s exactly how it happened.”
Sabau believes the culture around the football program needs to change.
(Leah Hogsten | The Salt Lake Tribune) Utah State head coach Blake Anderson talks with players as the Aggies host the Brigham Young University Cougars at Maverik Stadium on Oct. 1, 2021.
Notably, Anderson became the subject of headlines during a school investigation in 2021, when a Utah State student who said she was assaulted by a football player in 2019 alleged in a federal lawsuit that the university protects its football players and deliberately brushes alleged victims aside.
Anderson was hired as head coach in late 2020 and was not named as a defendant in the lawsuit. But the case brought to light recordings of Anderson, in which he could be heard talking about sexual assault victims and saying it “has never been more glamorized to be a victim.”
Anderson publicly apologized, but the player who took the recordings left the team and settled a lawsuit for $150,000 out of court. The school did not admit guilt in the case that the student filed in 2021 but agreed to pay her $500,000 the next year in a settlement that ended the high-profile case.
Since 2020, the U.S. Department of Justice has been on campus at Utah State, investigating Title IX issues within the football department. Sabau said the DOJ will stay in Logan for another year.
“We have to have integrity moving forward,” she said. “Utah State had the Department of Justice on campus since 2020 because of crimes with football, and a culture with football. We can’t keep moving that forward without change.”
“So yeah, sometimes good people make bad mistakes,” she continued Friday. “And it’s not popular, but you have to do what’s right. You have to do what’s right when no one’s watching. And you have to make decisions that are hard, and that are challenging.”
She added that there is “no athletic director in the country” who wants to terminate a football coach in July.
“It’s terrible timing for our young men, for the community, for the coaching staff, all of that,” she said.
