Boise State adds new women’s hoops assistant, cuts ties with staff member facing lawsuit
The Boise State women’s basketball team announced the hiring of Nia Jackson as assistant coach on Thursday, cutting ties with former assistant Cody Butler.
Butler, who had worked at Boise State since 2012, was put on administrative leave in January after an Idaho Statesman investigation revealed he faces a lawsuit alleging sexual abuse and harassment of a player in a previous position at Yakima Valley College.
The Idaho Statesman asked about the status of Butler’s employment with Boise State in multiple emails to both the university and the state controller’s office over the past month. Boise State refused to comment, while the controller’s office has not provided the Statesman with an update.
On Thursday, Boise State confirmed Butler is no longer employed at the university but had no further comment.
According to the state’s Transparent Idaho website, Butler is a former employee with a separation date of April 30. That was the day his contract expired. His salary for 2019-20 was $101,774.
Butler was sued in May of 2019 by a former women’s basketball player at Yakima Valley College. He was a men’s and women’s assistant coach at Yakima Valley from 2000 to 2002, the co-head coach of the women’s team in 2002-03 and the head women’s coach from 2003 to 2012.
The specific allegations in the lawsuit date as far back as 2000 and come from a woman who was on the Yakima Valley women’s basketball team from 2001 to 2003. The Idaho Statesman generally doesn’t name plaintiffs in sexual-abuse cases.
Jackson joins the Boise State staff after spending the past two seasons at Oregon, where she served as the team’s director of creativity. Her role with the Ducks included video coordinator duties, camp staging and promotion.
Before Oregon, Jackson was on the Loyola Marymount women’s basketball staff for four years. She was the program’s director of operations for three seasons and was promoted to assistant coach for the 2017-18 campaign.
“We are very excited to have Nia Jackson join our women’s basketball program,” Boise State coach Gordy Presnell said in a press release. “She is a dynamic, energetic and very talented coach who will add so much to our program. I know our players and coaches can’t wait to work with her.”
Jackson spent five seasons as a player at Oregon from 2007 to 2012. She was named to the All-Pac-12 Team in 2010-11 and was the Ducks’ MVP her junior and senior seasons.
This story was originally published June 25, 2020 at 3:35 PM.
