Auburn's president and board of trustees have laid the groundwork to end Jay Jacobs' tenure as athletics director, AL.com has learned. Unless the leadership changes its current position, which it discussed in a conference call this week, the only variables are who will replace Jacobs and when the transition will take place.

That transition was expected to take place after the current football season, but recent scandals involving the school's softball and men's basketball programs have accelerated the process, according to a source with knowledge of the situation.

Earlier Friday afternoon, Auburn president Steven Leath declined to comment when asked by AL.com if he still maintained confidence in Jacobs' ability to run the program given the scandals.

(Late Friday night, after this story was published, Leath released the following statement: "The report is inaccurate. Jay Jacobs is the athletics director, and I have had no such conference call with the Board of Trustees.")

A former Auburn walk-on football player, Jacobs was named Auburn's 14th athletics director in 2004 after working in various areas of the athletics department for two decades.

Auburn has won 12 national championships during Jacobs' tenure as AD, but the program has been plagued in recent years by a series of coaching hires that went wrong and scandals that put the university in a bad light.

At the moment, Birmingham law firm Lightfoot, Franklin and White is conducting separate reviews at the request of the university of the softball and men's basketball programs.

The softball review comes in the wake of the resignations of head coach Clint Myers and associate head coach Corey Myers after a Title IX complaint alleging the younger Myers had and pursued improper relationships with student-athletes and the elder Myers, his father, allowed the behavior to occur.

The men's basketball review is related to an FBI probe that has resulted in the arrests of 10 different people connected to the sport, including Auburn associate head coach Chuck Person. Person has been charged with six federal crimes for his alleged involvement in a bribery and conspiracy scheme to steer Auburn players to a disgraced financial adviser named Martin Blazer, who was working as an FBI informant.

In August, Jacobs said he "could have been more forthcoming" about the school's own investigation into former softball assistant Corey Myers. He issued a statement suggesting he had acted properly, but he was heavily criticized for allowing Myers to resign last fall but then return to the team. Myers resigned abruptly during the season in March, and his father followed him out the door in August, although Clint Myers' departure was called a "retirement" in Auburn's official release.

The basketball scandal has called into question Jacobs' selection of head coach Bruce Pearl, who was still under a show cause for NCAA violations in his previous coaching position at Tennessee when Auburn hired him.

One name that may receive consideration to replace Jacobs: David Benedict. Currently the UConn AD, Benedict spent two years as the chief operating officer of Auburn Athletics before taking the Connecticut job in 2016.