Oregon State is pushing back hard in its legal fight with former defensive coordinator Keith Heyward, denying the central claims in his countersuit and setting up more courtroom back-and-forth next year.
In a response filed earlier this month, OSU rejected Heyward’s allegations of breach of contract, defamation and retaliation tied to former athletic director Scott Barnes. The school’s outside counsel at Miller Nash argued that Heyward is trying to turn a standard contract-collection case into something much larger.
“Heyward’s counterclaims attempt to convert a routine contract collection into a case about leave rights, defamation, and interference,” the reply from OSU’s outside counsel from Miller Nash states. “Heyward is raising any excuse to make him the exception to the rule that is routine at OSU and at (NCAA) member institutions. When a coach departs early, the payment is commonly made by the coach or by the coach’s new institution, and OSU itself pays such amounts to other institutions when it hires their coaches.”
The dispute centers on a $50,000 buyout and a $6,500 relocation allowance that Oregon State says Heyward still owes. Heyward does not dispute that he has not repaid those amounts. But he is seeking more than $2.4 million from his alma mater and Barnes, saying Barnes told him OSU would not enforce the buyout when he resigned in January 2025 after his father died and his mother was hospitalized.
OSU flatly denies that version of events. The school’s reply says Barnes acted “within the course and scope of his employment, and in service of OSU’s institutional interests” when the buyout was enforced after Heyward was hired at Cal and when Barnes reached out to Cal about OSU’s playbook being referenced after Heyward’s hiring.
Heyward has said Barnes told him the release was “unconditional.” OSU says that never happened and that “OSU personnel told him multiple times that he would owe the obligation if he returned to coaching,” according to the filing.
The school also laid out 25 defenses in its reply to Heyward’s counterclaims.
One other piece of the dispute involves membership at the Corvallis Country Club. Heyward says OSU did not provide it, but the university says otherwise, arguing it “required only that he sign up for it, which he never did.”
The case is expected to keep moving into next year, with a conference scheduled for Feb. 10 in Benton County Circuit Court.
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