COLUMBUS, Ohio — The warning signs flared: delinquent payments for university travel expenses, a $600 night at a Florida strip club with at least one high school coach, a rash of missed meetings on recruiting trips for football players and late arrivals at practices. But Zach Smith, the Ohio State assistant coach at the center of it all, not only kept his job but got raises along the way.
Even before these episodes, described in a university report released Wednesday, he had been accused in 2009 of throwing his pregnant wife against a wall while an assistant at the University of Florida, though no charges were filed.