San Jose State volleyball head coach Todd Kress offered an announcement to Fox Information Digital Saturday after his crew’s loss within the Mountain West Convention match ultimate to Colorado State.
Kress addressed the nationwide controversy surrounding a transgender participant on his crew and 7 forfeited convention matches, together with a match semifinal with Boise State.
“I cannot sugarcoat our actuality for the final two months. Our crew ready and was able to play every match in line with established Mountain West and NCAA guidelines of play. We didn’t take away anybody’s participation alternatives,” Kress wrote.
Boise State, Wyoming, Utah State and Nevada forfeited a complete of seven matches towards SJSU this season.
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Kress mentioned every of these forfeits resulted within the crew’s gamers, coaches and staffers receiving “appalling, hateful messages.”
“Sadly, others who for years have performed this similar crew with out incident selected to not play us this season. To be clear, we didn’t have a good time a single win by forfeiture. As a substitute, we braced for the fallout. Every forfeiture announcement unleashed appalling, hateful messages people selected to ship on to our student-athletes, our teaching employees and lots of related to our program,” Kress wrote.
The coach, in simply his second season with the crew, admitted it was one of many hardest seasons of his life.
“This has been one of the tough seasons I’ve ever skilled, and I do know that is true as properly for a lot of of our gamers and the employees who’ve been supporting us all alongside. Sustaining our concentrate on the court docket and guaranteeing the general security and well-being of my gamers amid the exterior noise have been my priorities,” Kress mentioned.
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Kress was named in a lawsuit filed by crew co-captain Brooke Slusser and several other different Mountain West gamers towards the convention and San Jose State. The lawsuit alleges Kress has communicated with a non-public lawyer as a part of his effort to get Slusser faraway from the crew and has informed others he has filed Title IX complaints towards Slusser based mostly not on feedback Slusser has made in follow, however on communications Slusser has made to the media and in public boards regarding her beliefs.
Slusser has additionally alleged the college has threatened to remove her scholarship for talking on the problems of sharing a crew, locker room and bed room with transgender teammate Blaire Fleming.
Nonetheless, Kress thanked Slusser in his assertion Saturday, together with Fleming and the opposite seniors on the crew.
“Our crew performed their hearts out at this time, the way in which they’ve completed all season. I need to acknowledge and thank our seniors — Alessia [Buffagni], Chandler [Manusky], Brooke [Bryant], Brooke and Blaire — for his or her super efforts on the court docket all season lengthy. They’ve all helped us to get the place we’re,” Kress wrote.
Kress additionally thanked San Jose State College Police Chief Michael Carroll for his work defending the crew from potential threats this season.
A San Jose State spokesperson beforehand confirmed to Fox Information Digital that this system didn’t formally notify any of the opponents on its schedule of the scenario involving Fleming and Slusser forward of matches this season after Slusser joined her first lawsuit towards the NCAA in September over her trans teammate’s presence.
Nonetheless, that spokesperson additionally confirmed the college did coordinate police safety for the gamers with the faculties that hosted the crew’s away matches after safety measures needed to be elevated as a result of consideration the crew was getting.
When Southern Utah grew to become the primary program to announce it could be forfeiting a match towards the Spartans in early September, that was the primary indicator of heightened safety. That’s when the school introduced in armed safety.
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A San Jose State College spokesperson confirmed to Fox Information Digital the volleyball crew was informed it could be getting added safety of some form after the primary forfeit by an opposing program as information of Slusser’s lawsuit unfold.
Shortly after the primary forfeit, the college’s in-house police division was alerted to the scenario and received concerned. Police safety was assigned for each sport thereafter, and police departments at different campuses have been assigned to guard the crew when it traveled.
Police presence was noticeably robust for the Spartans’ first assembly towards eventual convention champion Colorado State Oct. 3. A number of officers have been photographed on the court docket that night time, wanting alert within the stands, entrances and on the gamers.
Colorado State College Police behind the San Jose State College Spartans’ bench monitor Moby Area throughout a volleyball match between the Spartans and the Colorado State Rams in Fort Collins, Colo., Oct. 3, 2024. (Santiago Mejia/San Francisco Chronicle through Getty Pictures)
Slusser beforehand informed Fox Information Digital she had obtained a warning from a teammate Oct. 2, the night time earlier than a match, to “keep away” in the course of the match as a result of one thing “dangerous” was going to occur to her.
San Jose State College responded to questions on whether or not federal investigators had been concerned.
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“The college has requested college students and employees to share all regarding communications with UPD to be evaluated and addressed appropriately, together with together with correct authorities the place acceptable,” San Jose State mentioned in a earlier assertion.
And Kress was tasked with teaching his crew by all of it. Kress just isn’t the coach who recruited Fleming to SJSU. That was former head coach Trent Kersten, who left this system after Fleming’s first season in San Jose State in 2022.
A lawsuit that features former Spartans assistant coach Melissa Batie-Smoose alleges Kersten recruited Fleming figuring out the participant was transgender however did not inform different gamers.
Kress took over this system in 2023 and expressed frustration with Kersten’s choice in an interview with OutKick.
San Jose State College Spartans head coach Todd Kress speaks with reporters after a loss towards the Colorado State College Rams in Fort Collins, Colo., Oct. 3, 2024. (Santiago Mejia/San Francisco Chronicle through Getty Pictures)
“My frustration with Trent is an unlucky scenario,” Kress mentioned. “[Kersten] clearly is aware of Blaire is within the crosshairs of this debate, and but he has not reached out to [Fleming] one time to examine in on [Fleming’s] psychological well being. I discover it unhappy, to be trustworthy.”
Earlier than that, Kress steered pressure within the locker room due to Fleming’s presence on the crew and Slusser’s lawsuits “won’t be a foul factor.”
“Typically pressure just isn’t essentially a foul factor, and I am not saying that there’s. However, you already know, while you do have pressure otherwise you do have confrontations, I imply, I am an individual that believes that, from confrontation, good issues normally occur. We settle our variations, and we work by it,” Kress informed reporters Oct. 3 after the primary Colorado State match.
“The very last thing that I might need is there’s the white elephant within the room, and there’s no pressure, we do not tackle it, and we by no means transfer previous it, proper? So I feel there could also be pressure, nevertheless it dies. If we’re in a gathering room and there is pressure, it dies there. If there’s pressure on the court docket, it dies there. We actually do not let the boundaries cross over, and that is how I feel we have been so profitable to this point.”
Now the Spartans’ match run is over. The gamers made it by unhurt. However the lawsuits proceed.
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