BTN.com staff, August 7, 2015
The University of Minnesota announced Friday morning that it has accepted the resignation of athletics director Norwood Teague.
Teague, 48, was hired in April 2012, replacing Joel Maturi; he hired men's basketball coach Richard Pitino and women's basketball coach Marlene Stollings, among other hires.
Teague came to Minnesota from VCU, where he spent six seasons and hired Shaka Smart, now the head coach at Texas.
Minnesota president Eric W. Kaler held a press conference Friday afternoon to address the resignation.
Watch his opening remarks in the video above.
Friday morning, Teague filmed this statement.
Here's a quick look at Minnesota's interim AD:
Meet Beth Goetz, @GopherSports' interim AD. pic.twitter.com/YRWJkgUyOU
— Big Ten Network (@BigTenNetwork) August 7, 2015
Also Friday morning, Kaler sent this letter, courtesy of startribune.com, to the staff about Teague's resignation:
I wanted you to be among the first to know that I have accepted the resignation of Gopher Athletics Director Norwood Teague, effective immediately.
Norwood's resignation follows the report of two recent incidents of sexual harassment of two non-student University employees. I will deliver additional comments at a 12:15 p.m. press conference today. Those will be available at discover.umn.edu at that time.
To be clear, sexual harassment will not be tolerated at the University of Minnesota and I sincerely regret that our employees experienced this behavior. The University has an explicit policy and a strong code of conduct that articulates our standards. Ensuring a healthy learning, working and living environment for all in our University community is very important.
My focus is to ensure the wellbeing of our students, faculty, staff and visitors across the University system. I am also working closely with Gopher Athletics to ensure a smooth leadership transition. Beth Goetz, deputy athletics director and senior woman administrator, has agreed to step in as interim athletics director. I have great confidence in our athletics program, its current direction and its recent successes. We will have more information about the next steps for Gopher Athletics within the next couple weeks. Thank you in advance for your patience and continued support for Gopher Athletics during this time.