Former St. John's men's basketball coach Mike Anderson said he was fired with cause in March only so the school could avoid paying his buyout and use the money to hire Rick Pitino, per arbitration documents obtained by ESPN on Thursday.
Anderson is seeking $45.6 million from the university -- $11.4 million that was left on his contract and an additional $34.2 million for "punitive" damages -- according to the "notice of intention to arbitrate" filed last month by Anderson's lawyer, John Singer of Singer Deutsch.
St. John's lured Pitino from Iona after firing Anderson on March 10.
According to the termination letter obtained by ESPN, Anderson was fired for "failure to create and support an environment that strongly encourages student-athletes who are in the men's basketball program to meet all university academic requirements," "failure to perform your duties and responsibilities in a manner that reflected positively on St. John's University ... in actions [that] brought serious discredit" to the school and "failure to appropriately supervise and communicate with your assistant coaches."
Per documents obtained by ESPN, Anderson claims St. John's officials had tried to offer him a buyout for less than the $11.4 million remaining on his deal before the school accused him of "fictitious" problems within his program and fired him for cause.
In a statement issued Thursday afternoon, St. John's University said it disputed "the wildly inaccurate claims" and that it would...
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