Former ESPN college football reporter Brett McMurphy appeared on SportsCenter with Scott Van Pelt late Wednesday night to discuss his reporting on the domestic violence allegations against former wide receivers coach Zach Smith.
McMurphy's reporting eventually led to Ohio State placing head football coach Urban Meyer on administrative leave.
“A couple of weeks ago, at Big Ten Media Days, I found out that Zach Smith had been arrested in Florida in 2009,” McMurphy told Van Pelt. “I also obtained a police report from the Powell, Ohio police department in 2015. I reported that and 15 minutes later Zach Smith was fired.
“Urban Meyer then, the next day, said he had no knowledge of the 2015 incident. He even asked why I would create such a story.”
McMurphy said he chased the story and ultimately was connected with Courtney Carano Smith, Zach Smith's ex-wife.
“I spent three days in Columbus and after talking to her, I got documents, texts, emails, photos, and basically it showed that the entire coaching staff—wives of the coaching staff knew what had been going on.”
McMurphy claimed the text messages implicated Urban Meyer.
“In these text message conversations, it showed that Urban Meyer knew about this,” he told Van Pelt.
Later, however, when pressed by Van Pelt for evidence linking Meyer to knowledge of the allegations, McMurphy admitted he did not have a smoking gun.
“I do not have any direct evidence—any text messages from Urban Meyer who said he knew about it,” McMurphy said.
“I find it hard to believe that the same couple [Urban and Shelley Meyer] counseled in 2009—she has evidence, she knows of domestic violence in 2015, that they completely ignore it and they have no knowledge.”
