Jim Tressel resigned as Ohio State's head coach early Monday morning, which was a bit surprising considering it being Memorial Day, and now the Buckeye's associate vice president and director of athletics Gene Smith has addressed the situation on the school's website.

The news of Tressel's resignation was first reported by the Columbus Dispatch, and the newspaper is now reporting that he was "encouraged" to resign, but Smith doesn't make that claim.

Smith notes that Tressel returned from a vacation on Sunday night and the two sat down to discuss what was going on with the program when the coach decided to resign before officially submitting his resignation on Monday morning. Tressel met with the majority of the team on Monday morning to explain the transition process with interim head coach Luke Fickell -- who Smith offered the job before meeting with the team -- also in attendance.

While this seems to all be quite shocking, it shouldn't come as a huge surprise as ESPN's Kirk Herbstreit reported on ESPN that 78 of the 81 coaches in Tressel's situation had either been fired or resigned.

The full video of Smith addressing the Buckeye Nation, as well as his thanking Tressel for his year's of leadership, is embedded below.