The messy week for Colorado State continues…

Steve Barnes has been suspended, just seven days into his tenure as the interim head coach at Colorado State. Barnes was named to the post last Saturday following the suspension of Larry Eustachy, who was placed on paid leave as the school investigated the climate and culture of the program. CSU assistant coach Jase Herl coached the Rams in today’s 90-79 win over San Jose State.

Barnes and Eustachy were high school and college teammates at Arcadia High School, Citrus Junior College and Chico State. The pair have competed or coached together in six different settings (Arcadia High, Citrus, Chico State, Idaho, Utah State and Iowa State), including all four of Eustachy’s head coaching posts.

Between his two stints at Iowa State, Barnes was the head coach at San Jose State University for three years, posting a 39-51 mark.

According report last week by the Coloradoan,  “Steve Barnes is (Eustachy’s) right-hand guy,” said a former CSU athletic department staff member who spoke on the condition of anonymity. “Sometimes, he was even worse than Larry, because Larry was never in the office to begin with, and Steve was. There’s a difference between coaching hard and just being emotionally abusive and verbally abusive and manipulative, from seeing how (Eustachy and Barnes) would treat the academic staff, to the strength and conditioning staff.”

Late last week, Colorado State players boycotted a practice, claiming that they were tired of hearing news from the media, instead of directly from AD Joe Parker.

More on this story as it continues to develop.