Assistant College Bowling Coach — Whose Wife is the Head Coach — Resigns After Affair With Student-Athlete Discovered

Jens Kalaene/AP

Stephen F. Austin State University assistant bowling coach Steve Lemke resigned in April after the university discovered he was having an affair with a student-athlete.

He participated in this affair while his wife — Amber Lemke — was his head coach.

According to a report from The Daily Sentinel, Lemke chose to resign as opposed to getting fired. When recently asked about it, he maintained that the relationship was consensual but “might have been amplified to the magnitude that it is now because of the national championship caliber that we’ve developed.”

In his time with the team, SFA won two national championships and also had two second-place finishes.

University Athletic Director Ryan Ivey said that although they were both consenting adults, the relationship violated the school’s rules.

The affair came to light when Amber saw a text message from the student on Steve’s phone. She’s since fled for divorce.

Still, Steve seemed to brush off the severity of the scandal.

“I knew it was kind of a no-no but there’s not a rule saying it can’t happen,” he said. “There’s not a law saying I’m going to go to jail for doing something like this. There’s nothing in stone. I guess it’s just an ethics code, like we frown upon it, but there’s no rule, there’s no law broken.”

Amber will be back next season as the team’s head coach. The student, whose identity was not revealed in the report, had no eligibility remaining.