Minnesota finally did something right by firing Tracy Claeys
By Pat Harty
IOWA CITY, Iowa – Loyalty is a wonderful trait until it becomes misguided or self-serving.
That was my immediate thought after seeing a tweet in which former Minnesota head football coach Jerry Kill is quoted as saying that he never would step foot in TCF Bank Stadium or the Minnesota football facility ever again.
Sadly, that was Kill’s reaction to Tracy Claeys being fired as the current Minnesota football coach on Sunday.
Minnesota quarterback Mitch Leidner also called Claeys’ firing a terrible decision and a pretty sad day for Gopher football.
I get it.
Kill and Leidner both like and respect Claeys and believe strongly that he received a raw deal by an administration that is out of touch with many of its student-athletes.
Some of your strongest bonds and friendships are built from athletics where players and coaches spend countless hours together striving and sacrifcing for the same goals.
Kill, Claeys and Leidner all have played a big part in making Minnesota respectable again in football. The Gophers finished 9-4 this season and shocked the college football world by overcoming the loss of 10 suspended players to defeat a pretty good Washington State team in the Holiday Bowl.
Claeys deserves credit for doing a masterful job of preparing his team amid tons of distractions, especially on defense where the Gopher secondary performed well despite being decimated by the suspensions.
But my question for Kill and Leidner and anybody else who feels that Claeys’ firing was unjustified is have you read the report that ultimately led to his dismissal?
The multiple suspensions were levied after University of Minnesota's Equal Opportunity and Affirmative Action (EOAA) office conducted an investigation in September into an alleged sexual assault that involved football players. The report was made public in mid-December, and to say that the details were disgusting, shocking and vile would be an understatement.
It’s hard to think of anything much worse than a group of student-athletes taking video of themselves having sexual activity with an unwilling female acquaintance.
Minnesota responded to the report by suspending 10 players.
And that’s when a bad situation became even worse.
Claiming a lack of due process, the Minnesota players said they would boycott the Holiday Bowl in support of their suspended teammates.
It made you wonder if they even cared about the alleged female victim in this case. It was a public relations disaster that didn’t start to correct itself until the players finally read the report and saw the horrific details and what they were defending.
Claeys certainly didn’t help his cause by voicing his support for his players on Twitter in wake of the suspensions. Not only was it disrespectful to the victim in this case, it was insubordination, considering how Claeys’ bosses felt.
It’s hard for somebody who covers Iowa athletics to know all the details about whether Claeys already was on thin ice before his tweet. But from an outsider's view, the tweet seems to have sealed Claeys’ fate, and deservedly so.
Claeys had to be aware of at least some of the details of the case when he posted his tweet. So what was he thinking?
It sent a terrible message, much like when former Iowa men’s basketball coach Steve Alford repeatedly proclaimed that Pierre Pierce was innocent of sexual-assault charges in 2002. Pierce, one of Alford’s top players, ultimately pleaded guilty to a reduced misdemeanor in a case in which the victim was a UI female student-athlete at the time.
A University of Iowa report then stated that Alford’s comments “implied that he disbelieved and discredited the claims of the student victim, and his words were perceived as reflecting insensitivity to issues of sexual assault and sexual violence.” Pierce was imprisoned later on separate charges that included assault with intent to commit sex assault.
Alford finally issued a public apology for his comments in 2013, shortly after being hired as the new head coach at UCLA. His handling of the Pierce case became a hot topic with the UCLA media, forcing Alford to take action.
“At that time, I instinctively and mistakenly came to his defense before knowing all the facts,” Alford said in his apology. “I wanted to believe he was innocent, and in response to a media question, I publicly proclaimed his innocence before the legal system had run its course. This was inappropriate, insensitive and hurtful, especially to the young female victim involved, and I apologize for that.”
Some Iowa fans wanted Alford to be fired for his handling of the Pierce case. However, the UI administration stuck with Alford and ultimately paid the price.
Minnesota Athletic Director Mark Coyle risked the same thing happening with Claeys and decided to take action with the full support of the administration.
Claeys never publicly proclaimed the innocence of any of the suspended players, but he voiced his support for a player boycott that was organized for all the wrong reasons and without gathering enough information.
A college athletic program has three primary goals for which it strives to meet on a continual basis. Those goals are to win, to graduate players and for its student-athletes to behave in a way that is socially acceptable.
If the Gophers hire the right head coach and continue to climb the ladder of success, the current divide will start to narrow.
And with time, maybe Kill and Leidner will understand why Minnesota severed ties with Claeys.
Kill recently was hired as the new offensive coordinator at Rutgers. Minnesota and Rutgers won’t face each other in 2017 unless it would occur in the Big Ten Championship game, which would rank up there with the Miracle on Ice.
So Kill has plenty of time to see the light in this case and to realize that his support for Claeys is wrong..