Bad News for Duke

[Sonny]

and the verdict is...



Not Guilty

[Sonny]

In the words of the slightly troubled and famous Mr. Barnum (of Barnum and Bailey's Circus) when asked about his cruel yet popular side show 'freaks' attraction:
"I don't care what you say about me, as long as you spell my name right".

Unfortunately I don't really buy into that whole "All press is good press" mentality. I wish lacrosse would have never been a national headline for 2 weeks under these circumstances and would just have remained black listed from ESPN. So yeah, I would have to say this whole event is not and never will be a topic our lacrosse community will find benefit from.

[Sonny]

Talking heads everywhere just exploded but the damage to the sport has already been done. If I was a Duke player, I'd be looking to transfer.

[Sonny]

There is a better discussion of this on laxpower. No reason to redo it here. As explained there, a negative DNA result does not close the case. Like all of us, I hope the Duke players are cleared of the major charges in the long run (and it will probably be a very, very long time before this is finished), but there haven't even been charges yet. This probably still has a long way to go.

[Lax_Stats]

http://www.nbc17.com/news/8602612/detail.html

[Lax_Stats]

anyone think they still have a chance to play anymore lacrosse season this year?

Impossible! They don't have a Head coach anymore!

[Sonny]

In related news...

ACC Announces Tournament Seedings, Game Times

April 10, 2006

GREENSBORO, N.C. - The Atlantic Coast Conference announced today revised seeding procedures and bracket for the 2006 ACC Men's Lacrosse Championship to be held April 28 and 30 at M&T Bank Stadium in Baltimore, Md.

Following last week's decision by Duke University to suspend the remainder of its men's lacrosse season, the Blue Devils' two ACC regular season games with North Carolina (11-8 Duke win) on March 18 and Maryland (8-7 Maryland win) on March 4 will be vacated (resulting in no contests) for seeding purposes only.

In addition, the Championship bracket has been changed with only one semifinal game between the No. 2 and No. 3 seeds to be played on Friday, April 28 at 8:00 p.m. The winner of Friday's semifinal contest will advance to play the No. 1 seed in the Championship game at 3:30 p.m., on Sunday, April 30.

The seeds have been determined for the 2006 Men's Lacrosse Championship and are as follows:

Semifinal Game - Friday, April 28, 2006, 8:00 pm
No. 2 Maryland (1-1 ACC) vs. No. 3 North Carolina (0-2 ACC)

Championship Game - Sunday, April 30, 3:30 pm (RSN-TV*)
No. 1 Virginia (2-0 ACC) vs. Winner of Maryland/North Carolina

* indicates game will be televised regionally on Fox Sports Net South, SunSports, Comcast SportsNet, New England Sports Network (NESN).

Along with Duke University's decision to cancel the remainder of the men's lacrosse season and all associated activities, no members of the men's lacrosse program will be considered for ACC post season awards.

[Gregg Pathiakis]

I don't have time to find the article on Boston.com right now, but I was reading a Boston Globe story today about the tension (past and present) between Duke and NCCU. One student (think it was an NCCU student, but not sure) mentioned that her faculty adviser advised her (before this whole incident) to stay away from lacrosse players. Just thought I'd point that out.

[TexOle]

As of now the Duke players are clean. We will continue to see what happens, but this issue might be over. This incident could have a political message. The politicians in Durham, NC are probably licking their chops right now. All they had to do was show that they will protect the local citizens over Duke. JAG did an episode about this years ago, and it was really eye opening.

[Rob Graff]

Interesting quote from an "expert" on criminal law:

Stan Goldman, who teaches criminal law, evidence and criminal procedure at Loyola Law School in Los Angeles, said the DNA results don't mean that Nifong can't go forward with the case -- but the test results make a successful prosecution much harder.
"Isn't the absence of DNA evidence, given the way the victim has described the crime, in and of itself almost enough to raise a reasonable doubt?" he said. "That's all the defense has to do."

http://sports.espn.go.com/ncaa/news/story?id=2404002

[swampthing]

thanks for the article rob.

so there's something a little off about this: the image of lacrosse as well as that of duke university is damaged because a stripper accuses the team of raping her and she can't prove it? not that rape should be taken lightly, but imagine how heavy this has to sit for players/supporters of duke lacrosse and specifically seniors. i mean, on top of cancelling the season and not allowing players to receive post season awards, everyone is coming down pretty hard on these guys, especially considering that punishments were dealt before anything was even proven (and it's all over the media!). if you're going to say they deserve the punishment purely for the party they threw, consider the division 1 football programs who do the same without such incredible consequences. when several UT (texas) football players were accused of crimes this year they were allowed to play games until it was settled in court (and they were found not guilty). i fear there may be some bias against duke and lacrosse purely out of jealousy because of their preppy connotations.

anyhow, my point out of all this is that they should have let duke continue playing until it was settled in court and then taken the necessary actions, and if the players are proven innocent they ought to sue the girl for slander and ruining their year.

[A.J. Stevens]

not that rape should be taken lightly, but imagine how heavy this has to sit for players/supporters of duke lacrosse and specifically seniors. i mean, on top of cancelling the season and not allowing players to receive post season awards, everyone is coming down pretty hard on these guys, especially considering that punishments were dealt before anything was even proven (and it's all over the media!). .

Don't forget about the unemployed coach who spent a major portion of his life building a national championship caliber team.

[swampthing]

yeah there's sixteen years down the crapper, not to mention how this is going to tarnish his resume

[Lax_Stats]

yeah there's sixteen years down the crapper, not to mention how this is going to tarnish his resume

I don't see this situation affecting Mike Pressler's resume in the least! He had absolutely nothing to do with this situation whatsoever!!! He is a proven winner with a great resume!! He will be snapped up rather quickly. Any program out there that was thinking about possibly making a coaching change after the 2006 season now has a huge incentive to do so knowing that Coach Pressler is available to possibly take their team to the national championships!

[PigPen]

I don't see this situation affecting Mike Pressler's resume in the least! He had absolutely nothing to do with this situation whatsoever!!! He is a proven winner with a great resume!! He will be snapped up rather quickly. Any program out there that was thinking about possibly making a coaching change after the 2006 season now has a huge incentive to do so knowing that Coach Pressler is available to possibly take their team to the national championships!

In a perfect world this would be true-but unfortunately this is not the case. Ask Gary Barnett (not exactly the same-but close enough for this illustration). If I am Pressler, I'm getting a good civil lawyer to clear my name.