DUKE LACROSSE: STILL DE-PRESSED

The good news is that the travesty dogging three former Duke lacrosse players is over, as the prosecution’s case contained more holes than Bonnie and Clyde’s last ride.

The bad news is that the other travesty in this whole cesspool of ambition and mob-mentality vengeance will not be rectified. Mike Pressler, Duke’s head lacrosse coach at the time and designated fall guy, got screwed, hung out to dry, left for dead and otherwise treated like shit.

When everything exploded in March of last year, the outrage was almost instantaneous … as was the assumption of guilt. The usual suspects lined up at the tabloid trough and gorged themselves. I remember wondering if someone was going to have to give Nancy Grace oxygen, she was so amped about the ratings, er … I mean … allegations.

The racial and class implications have been well-documented as has the anguish visited on the accused young men and their families. What has not been nearly as well-documented is the price paid by Pressler and his family.

In the wake of the scandal, he was forced to resign by Duke president Richard Brodhead. Threatening and profane signs appeared on the family’s front lawn. Hate emails, phone calls and verbal threats followed Pressler’s wife Sue and their two daughters Janet and Maggie.

Still they tried to ride out the storm. Pressler believed his players were innocent. His support never wavered. Conversely, he was offered up as the sacrificial lamb by a freaked-out, knee-jerk president and a please-don’t-fire-me-too athletic director named Joe Alleva.

The Presslers now must uproot their daughters and pack not only their belongings but a thoroughly unwarranted stigma as they move to Smithfield, R.I. where Pressler is coaching at Bryant University, a Division II school. No disrespect to the Bryant Bulldogs, but Pressler has gone from the penthouse to the Port-a-Potty.

My guess is that Bryant will be a national power in less than five years. Pressler spent 16 seasons at Duke, compiling a 153-82 record with three ACC championships, 10 NCAA Tournament berths and an appearance in the 2005 national championship game. He was named the 2005 USILA National Coach of the Year.

He is, by all accounts, a great coach.

That didn’t matter. One reason it didn’t matter is the seething resentment of collegiate athletics by most of the academic community. Eighty-eight professors at Duke came barreling out in unified indignation aimed at Pressler. He had let the lacrosse players get out of control. He was turning a blind eye to their depravity. He was personally packing the one-hitters and cleaning out the beer bongs. He was Bluto in a Blue Devils hat!

All of which is just ridiculous. For some reason, professors want to believe that big-time athletics are 100% horrible. They want to believe that college athletics are a blight that irreparably harms the education process. And that the coaches are somehow inherently responsible for the behavior of the students on their teams. Or worse, encourage it and foster some sort of bacchanalian atmosphere.

Well, you heard it here first, the head coach of any collegiate team bears NO responsibility for keggers thrown, bongs smoked, blowjobs gotten and acid dropped. None.

Actually, I’ll amend that.

The head coach bears exactly the same amount of responsibility as each student’s academic advisor, RA and the admissions staff. Especially at a school as prestigious as Duke. Sure, Pressler recruited them. But you guys let them in. And you guys advise them on their majors and what courses to take and how to navigate the treacherous waters of self-important, insulated, tenured educators who only break a sweat when the elevators are broken.

Ironically, in the arena of setting an example of how one might conduct oneself in the real world, Pressler has been a champion. The enlightened ones at Duke charged with the betterment of our privileged young citizens have, in a word, sucked.

How do I come by this razor-sharp insight? I was a college athlete myself. As it happens , my career as a student-athlete-partier overlapped that of Mike Pressler’s. We both attended Washington and Lee University. He was three years ahead of me. He was an All-American football and lacrosse player. I was a basketball player – minus the All-American. Minus the All-Campus for that matter. He was elected to the W&L athletic Hall of Fame. I was elected keymaster a few times.

My basketball coach was Verne Canfield, a hard-ass stickler who played every mind game in the book. And I still drank too much beer and tried to sleep with many different girls. (Ed. emphasis added by the aforementioned Many Different Girls.)

Verne had early-morning Saturday practices. And I still did shots of Jager until I passed out on the footbridge wrapped in a Snoopy blanket. Verne rode us about our grades. And I still tried to drive along the foggy Skyline Drive while on mushrooms.

The point is — General Patton could have been my coach and I still would have played quarters until I puked through my nose.

It is called being away at college. And no coach should be expected to be responsible for any of that foolishness. Namely, because it is impossible. Mike Pressler was busy coaching and being a good husband and father. He didn’t have time to monitor the latest beer hats and strip Twister games.

And one more thing. Let’s just get it out in the open. Lacrosse players are prodigious partiers. Always have been, always will be. So are large numbers of non-athletic students. Always have been, always will be. Young men and women away at college are allowed to behave like immature assholes. Because that is what they are.

And no one is going to change that.

And its not Mike Pressler’s fault.

I knew Mike Pressler for a short time --- and yet he left an impression. He dedicated himself completely to whatever he undertook. He was intense. He was a maniac on the field. He was a coach’s dream. I’m sure he did many boneheaded things off the field in his illustrious four years at college. Because he was an idiot. Just like everyone else.

Pressler is the man he is, in large part, because of the sum of his experiences at Washington and Lee. Not only is he one of the best in his chosen profession, he has proven himself time and again to be principled, honorable and loyal.

Too bad the same can’t be said for his former colleagues at Duke.


If you want to read Pressler’s whole side of the story, it comes out in June:
It's Not About the Truth: The Untold Story of the Duke Lacrosse Rape Case and the Lives It Shattered by Don Yeager and Mike Pressler