Five players have been kicked off of UConn’s football team for disciplinary reasons. Junior defensive end Harold Stanback, junior safety/linebacker Ricky McCollum, sophomore wide receiver Nollis Dewar and two freshmen, receiver Todd Dorcelus and linebacker Carl Teague have all been removed from the team by head coach Randy Edsall… because they bought beer.
Bought beer. Not “drank beer.” Not “hard a big drunken party.” Not “got hammered and passed out in the middle of Rentschler Field.” They just bought two six packs of beer. Really, that’s it.
The team was staying at a hotel before Saturday’s game against Navy, and five guys went across the street to a convenience store. They purchased one six-pack of Heineken (it is UConn, after all), and one six-pack of Corona.
“We were walking back to the hotel and [assistant coach Carl Kotz] saw us. We just said we were going back to the room. He asked if we had anything in our bags and we all said no. Then we were in meetings later and he went through our rooms and searched through all our things and he said he found the beer.
“No one drank it. No one did anything with it. Nothing happened with the alcohol. And I am 21. There was no crime committed at all.”
And they’re gone. I find that bizarre. Did UConn convert to a Mormon school and not tell anyone about it? I understand that you don’t want players drinking the night before a game (and certainly, that’s never happened in UConn or college football history), but you’re going to kick them off the team for beer they didn’t even drink? That seems excessively harsh.
The Big Picture
what the story doesn’t say is that they all gang-banged a 65-year old woman too.
October 11, 2006 at 3:54 am
Mark
Yeah, and then they pushed her in front of a bus on the street.
Agreed, excessively stupid and harsh.
October 11, 2006 at 7:06 am
Dave
I think it’s rash to say it’s too harsh. We don’t know if there are specific team rules that say you can’t even have beer when they are on the road. I imagine that’s why they were asked about it. Not to mention the fact that the Assistant asked them what they had and they flat-out lied about it.
Everybody pisses and moans about jerks like T.O. and Starbury – well, this is how guys like that get started. They plead and charm their way out of small infractions, and hone their skills at getting away with stuff.
Hey, if my kid knew there was a team rule against having beer, and if he looked at the Assistant with a straight face and lied to him like it was the easiest thing in the world, he deserves to get kicked off the team. The rules were there, and you decided “Fuck, I don’t have to follow them.”
Guess what? you fuckin’ do.
October 11, 2006 at 10:51 am
Matt
I’m as big a Uconn fan and supporter as anyone, but it seems a trifle inequitable that you can steal laptops, attempt to pawn them, and continue to play a full season conference schedule on the basketball team, but a 21-year old who purchases beer gets thrown off the football team. Says a lot about the priorities of the administration and athletic department, since Uconn football sucks balls and the basketball team had NO business not winning out last year. But since it was the coach’s decision, not the school’s, it’s also possible that Edsall is simply less of an obscene prick than Calhoun.
October 11, 2006 at 12:10 pm
Pacifist Viking
If I were one of these players, I would be contacting a lawyer regarding suing two parties:
1. the coaches who went into their rooms to rummage through their things.
2. the hotel which allowed them to do so.
October 11, 2006 at 4:03 pm
BraveSrRob
Uhm, the coaches who work for the school that paid for their rooms? Yes, why should the hotel let people that paid for the rooms into them. How DARE they?
October 12, 2006 at 10:19 am
Pacifist Viking
BraveSrRob, that’s why I’d want to TALK to a lawyer about it. I don’t know what sort of rights to privacy a player has when staying in the hotel room, but if I were a player, I’d at least want to know, according to the law, what they are.
October 12, 2006 at 12:07 pm
WestCoast
Atleast they should have had the players present for the search. The beer story is just a cover up for the roids and speed they found. If it were a UConn basketball player, the asst coach would have bought it for them. That’s what those beyatches are for at UConn.
October 12, 2006 at 2:47 pm
john baranowsky
Edsall and the program have been charged with 27 counts of NCAA violations (Institutional Control and Responsibliity). NCAA and Big East Conference and majot CT newspapers have been notified. “Beergate” is but the latest UConn/Edsall transgresion. See also “Taylorgate”, “Pelletgungate”, “Aureimmogate”, “Laptopgate”, “Davisgate”, “Lansanagqate”, on and on it goes. UConn football is a renegate program which has attrachted national attention. Made possible by lack of an effective AD. President Austin has condoned this behavior. What a mess. I am speaking as an insider, father of a victim of Coughlin wannabe Edsall. I know Todd Norley, and Edsall, you are no Todd Norley! GO back to the trailer park that you crawled out of.
October 13, 2006 at 9:36 pm