Francis told Sportsradio 610 in Houston that he wasn't at the Super Bowl on Sunday, and that he has the video surveillance tapes to prove it.

"It was reported recently that I was the most popular athlete in Houston," said Francis. "If I was at the Super Bowl, I'm pretty sure someone would have seen me."

According to Van Gundy, Francis told him today that he did not want to reveal the family problems to Van Gundy, so he told him he was at the Super Bowl.

610 also went on to report that Francis stated he and Van Gundy had breakfast Wednesday morning to resolve their issues, but the Rockets coach says that breakfast meeting never occurred.

This is a battle Francis will most likely lose. His public relations firm had egg all over their face on Monday when they said Steve had a "family issue that has since been resolved", when Van Gundy had already made it clear publically that Francis' choice was to miss the team flight to attend the Super Bowl.

Whether he really did attend the Super Bowl might just be irrelevant.

In defense of Steve (albeit a very weak one), his plan all along was to attend the game Monday, catching a flight in the morning to meet up with his teammates in Phoenix. These kind of exceptions would be allowed under Rudy Tomjanovich, but Van Gundy, riding a 3-game skid, was livid with the decision.

Francis however told the radio station that the plane left at 2:00pm Sunday, and he was at the airport at 2:15pm.

So now this issue of "he said-he said" gets bigger and bigger, with neither Van Gundy nor Francis budging on their versions of the story. The egos are large enough here that neither is going to like coming out of this one as the liar, so what should have been resolved by now continues.