Tape prompted Bernie Fine's firing

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SYRACUSE, N.Y. -- Syracuse chancellor Nancy Cantor says the school decided to fire associate head basketball coach Bernie Fine upon hearing an audiotape recorded by Bobby Davis, one of three men who have accused Fine of molesting them as minors.

The university fired Fine on Sunday after ESPN broadcast the 2002 audiotape, recorded by Davis, of a conversation between him and a woman ESPN identified as Fine's wife, Laurie, in which she says she knew "everything that went on."

Cantor says if the tape had surfaced in 2005, when the university did its own investigation, Fine would have been fired and that the school would have fired him immediately when Davis' allegations became public Nov. 17 had it known about the tape.

Cantor's comments appeared in a published response to a USA Today editorial Thursday that calls on Syracuse to release a "full accounting" of what it did and why Fine was kept on the job.

Syracuse men's basketball coach Jim Boeheim did not address the Fine investigation at the start of his weekly radio show.

When the show began, host Matt Park said Boeheim had already made "extensive comments" Tuesday.

"If you want to talk about basketball, please call," Park said. "There will be nothing more to say about the investigation."

Outside the Carrier Dome, more than a dozen students had put up tents in a temporary encampment called "Boeheimburg, already waiting by the doors for Friday's night game against Florida (No. 9 ESPN/USA Today, No. 10 AP).

Huddling against the cold, one group of students said they had been waiting outside since Tuesday and enthusiastically supported Boeheim. Max Kaplan, a freshman from Randolph, N.J., called Boeheim "the face of Syracuse basketball."

Information from The Associated Press was used in this report.

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