The Ohio Supreme Court declined today to hear Ohio State University’s appeal of a lawsuit filed by a former head men’s basketball coach.

The court’s action means that Ohio State, which fired Mr. O’Brien in 2004, must now pay him the more than $2-million that a state court awarded him in 2006.

“It was impossible to put it behind me,” Mr. O’Brien told the Associated Press. “Hopefully this could be the first step to doing just that.”

In a statement, a university spokesman, Jim Lynch, said Ohio State was “disappointed” that the court had declined to hear the case.

The university fired Mr. O’Brien after learning that he had lent $6,000 to a recruit in 1998 in violation of NCAA rules. Mr. O’Brien sued Ohio State, asserting that the university had no cause to fire him because the loan was not a “material breach” and did not justify breaking his contract with the university.

In 2006 the Ohio Court of Claims awarded Mr. O’Brien more than $2 million in the case. An appeals court upheld the $2-million award to Mr. O’Brien, and the university turned to the Supreme Court.

The Supreme Court’s announcement today that it would not hear the case means that Ohio State’s appeals are exhausted.

One month after the state court ruled in favor of Mr. O’Brien, the NCAA placed Ohio State on three years of probation and levied stiff sanctions against the coach. It has since lifted some of those punishments, and recently said that Mr. O’Brien could return to coaching as soon as next month. —Libby Sander