Mike Pressler, Head Coach for Duke's lacrosse team, has resigned.
Color me confused. What does the coach have to do with this? Was he at the party where the alleged assualt happened? I guess this is an honorable move, but I think it is a little silly. He's an athletic coach. I don't think he is responsible for the behavior of his players off the playing field. These aren't high school kids, they are adult students at one of the top ranked universities in the United States.
The freakier part of the story is the email sent by one of the players that was disclosed in a search:
Earlier Wednesday, authorities unsealed documents stating that hours after the alleged rape, a player apparently sent an e-mail saying he wanted to invite more strippers to his dorm room, kill them and skin them. It was not clear whether the message was serious or a joke.
You know, I have a fairly dark sense of humor and I wrote some dumb shit in college (although we didn't have email in my day), but WTF?? This is just bizarre. At last, we have a view into the warped mind of the steakhead lacrosse player.
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7 comments:
The difference between a high school student and a college freshman can be only a few months. There are plenty of college kids who are just that, kids - not adults. I remember some of them...
Pressler isn't responsible for these kids off the playing field, but he obviously feels some sort of responsibility. Let him go.
Here's hoping the whole team is disbanded, the three kids arrested and jailed, and the emailer put in a padded room.
(BTW - they may be "top ranked", but I've never really considered Duke to be any more than another school with a basketball team....)
I'd agree with you if it wasn't for the fact that from the first recruiting visit to the last game of their college career the coach and the program guide just about every aspect of these kids lives while in school. Coaches do in fact own a great deal of accountability for behavior off the field.
Look at the case of Tony Cole here at UGA, Maurice Clarett, or the entire football program out at Colorado State. The NCAA and the universities have VERY strict behavioral guidelines for their student/athletes that the coach is accountable to enforce. It's very much a part of his job. Coaches hold huge sway over the lives of these kids. They are the ones who either use them to win championships and toss them aside, think Bobby Bowden @ FSU, or actually guide these guys both on and off the field and get them to think about life after sports (think Bobby Knight, despite his nutty behavior, has one of the highest graduation rates of any Div 1A program. If Bobby Knight got word that ANYTHING like the Duke thing was going on with his team, he'd more than likely get arrested himself after personnally kicking the asses of anyone involved.
I do however agree with the personal accountability of the individual athletes and those who may have had a chance to do the right thing by stopping those directly participating, and didn't. They should bare the biggest burden of this atrocious behavior and I bet they will.
I have a sneaky suspicion that there are more stories to be told about his program that he's hoping he can avoid by getting out now.
Duke is a good...safety school
Tony -
I don't think that is as true with lacrosse at a place like Duke. I'd agree if we were talking about Auburn football. Duke lacrosse is not a huge, powerful, money-making program like Indiana basketball.
Perhaps not, but living at West Point and attending the University of Maryland (note: I said attended not graduated), both huge lacrosse schools, I can tell you first hand that major full ride scholarships are handed out for lacrosse, especially Duke who has a historically winning program.
Nonetheless, much accountability for players off field behavior still sits with coaching staffs even for the less spotlighted sports.
I've found lacrosse players to be much like hockey players which I once was (not at the collegiate level though). Having been one of them, I can tell you what kind of guys most of them are: Think MTV's Jackass.
Tony -
No disagreements here. Even at Yale, many (though certainly not all) of the hockey and football players were steakheads of the highest order.
Actually, we called them "Buzzards" (pronounced "Boo-Zards") back then.
D
Say what you will - I blame the parents.
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