Louisville has fired football coach Bobby Petrino.
The move, which was first reported by Pat Forde of Yahoo Sports, is effective immediately.
At 2-8, the Cardinals are currently mired in one of their worst seasons in more than two decades, suffering their seventh straight loss this weekend, a 54-23 affair to Syracuse. The team is winless in the ACC Atlantic Division.
Yahoo Sports is reporting that Petrino's buyout is in the $14 million range but that the school had seen enough despite the 57-year-old having a winning record (32-26) in his second stint with the school.
Louisville becomes the fourth school with a coaching opening this season, joining Bowling Green, Maryland and Kansas.
Athletics director Vince Tyra announced the move in a statement Sunday saying he felt that the program "needs different leadership and we owe it to our student-athletes and fans to get this turned around."
Speculation turns to Purdue coach Jeff Brohm as a possible replacement for Petrino. Brohm, who is a Louisville native, has quickly risen in the coaching ranks with head coaching stops at Western Kentucky and now the Boilermakers.
He's well-known among the Louisville fans after spending four seasons as the starting quarterback for the Cardinals under coach Howard Schnellenberger in the mid-1990s. He also spent time as an assistant coach at the school from 2003-08.
Brohm is currently in his second season at Purdue, where he has amassed a 12-11 record. In five total seasons as a head coach at WKU and Purdue, he is 42-21.
Louisville ranks near the bottom of the country in scoring defense (42 points per game), total defense (468 yards per game) and scoring offense (21 points per game).
