Jimmy Lake receives discipline from Washington following altercation with player

Jimmy Lake received discipline from Washington following an incident on the sideline of the game against Oregon when he made contact with a player.

The incident involved LB Ruperake Fuavai as the Washington head coach was caught on the TV broadcast hitting Fuavai in the facemask after he got into it with an Oregon player.

UW’s second-year coach has been suspended without pay for the Arizona State game on Saturday, athletics director Jen Cohen announced Monday morning, the Seattle Times reported. Defensive coordinator Bob Gregory will serve as the Huskies’ acting head coach.

“Our staff has spent the last 24-plus hours reviewing video of the incident, as well as speaking with Coach Lake, the involved student-athlete and several other student-athletes and members of the staff, and I have made the decision to suspend Coach Lake for next Saturday’s game against Arizona State,” Cohen said in a statement. “President (Ana Mari) Cauce, our Faculty Athletics Representative, Alexes Harris, and members of our executive staff are in agreement that while we do not believe that his actions were intentional or deliberate, we can have no tolerance for a coach interacting with a student in the manner Coach Lake did. We have high expectations of conduct for our coaches, and we will not shy away from those expectations.”

After the game, when asked if he regretted striking Fuavai, Lake responded: “I separated him. I didn’t strike him. I separated him.”

Jimmy Lake pops Ruperake Fuavai in the helmet and shoves him for getting into it with Jaylon Redd on the sideline pic.twitter.com/7AdSuugGe3

— Ralph Amsden (@ralphamsden) November 7, 2021

Keith Farner

A former newspaper veteran, Keith Farner is a news manager for Saturday Down South.