Pat Chambers resigned Wednesday following an investigation by Penn State into allegations of inappropriate conduct by the longtime men’s basketball coach.
In a statement, Penn State said new allegations surfaced after The Undefeated reported in July that Rasir Bolton — who transferred from Penn State to Iowa State in the summer of 2019 — said he decided to leave the Nittany Lions because Chambers made a reference to a noose around Bolton’s neck.
Bolton told The Undefeated that he recalled Chambers saying, “I want to be a stress reliever for you. You can talk to me about anything. I need to get some of this pressure off you. I want to loosen the noose that’s around your neck.”
“The new allegations surfaced shortly after The Undefeated’s article and a review was conducted jointly by Penn State’s Affirmative Action and Athletics Integrity offices,” Penn State said in its statement.
Chambers said in a statement provided to ESPN that he made the decision to take “a break to re-set and chart our path forward.”
Athletic director Sandy Barbour said that accepting Chambers’ resignation is “in the best interest of Penn State, our program and our student-athletes.” Barbour said the school received the results of the investigation within the past two weeks and that the new allegation was previously unknown to the school and was unrelated to the incident Bolton detailed to The Undefeated.
Although Barbour would not provide any details related to the new allegation, she said no NCAA rules violations were involved.
Chambers had been the head coach at Penn State since 2011, and he led the Nittany Lions to a 26-win season in 2017-18. Penn State was poised for an NCAA tournament appearance this past season before the coronavirus pandemic led to the cancellation of the NCAA tournament. It would have been the school’s first NCAA tournament appearance since 2011 and fifth since 1965.