Schools will treat the allegations differently after the Michigan State case

ROSEMONT, Ill. – Michigan State coach Tom Izzo said Thursday he had correctly handled all charges of misconduct in his basketball program and said his only regret regarding the upheavals of the year Last around the school and his athletic department was that he would not have been able to talk about the problems in more detail last winter.

At the Media Day on Thursday in Chicago, Izzo spoke at length about what he had learned as a result of reports that the university had mismanaged allegations of sexual assault. and violence against women against student athletes, including members of the Spartans basketball program.

He stated that some of these incidents would be treated differently as they occurred today, due to the changing conceptions of society on how to deal with accusations of this nature.

"Everyone will do different things now," Izzo said. "I think every child is going to be suspended now, and that seems fine unless it's your child, and if that's your child, you're going to look at things differently." something that someone has done wrong, so we'll take care of it appropriately, what we have, it's the only thing I'm going to stay on. "

In January, ESPN announced that the former Michigan state player, Travis Walton, had been allowed to continue to be part of the program under Izzo while he was facing a criminal charge for having allegedly hit a MSU student at a bar in January 2010. Walton was part of the team as a student. assistant coach at the time. That summer, another student accused Walton and two basketball players of having sexually assaulted her in April of this year, according to a university document.

Walton denied sexually assaulting anyone. He has never been charged with sexual assault related to the 2010 allegation. He also denied having hit the other woman; this case was filed in the place of it pleading for a civil offense for trash.

When asked if he would treat Walton's situation differently, Mr. Izzo stated that he was unaware of the incident that occurred at the Bar in January.

"Would things be handled differently?" I'm a little embarrassed to say yes, "said Izzo. "Every kid would be suspended for whatever was going on.Some of these kids were hanging in. It's hard to suspend someone on something you did not even know, I can not do that."

ESPN's January report quoted a letter that Lauren Allswede, former sexual assault counselor at the MSU, had provided to university officials stating that Walton and two players had been named in a report of sexual assault. Izzo did not directly address these allegations of sexual assault on Thursday.

Izzo was questioned about the April 2010 charges against Walton and the two players during interviews in September 2012 with investigators from the US Department of Education, according to correspondence that ESPN has received from MSU earlier this year. These interviews were part of a larger ministry-led investigation into the treatment of sexual harassment and sexual violence by MSU, and this particular incident was not mentioned in the ministry's final report.

"Coach Izzo and [then-athletic director] Mark Hollis told the [Office for Civil Rights] this [they] felt that they had handled the situation appropriately at the time, and [were] Following the policies in effect at the time, "Emily Gerkin Guerrant, spokesperson for the MSU, wrote in an email that he was at the origin of several policy changes since 2010. . " But if the same scenario happened today, they would manage it differently. "

The woman said she was raped off campus in April 2010 by Walton and the two players, according to the letter. The woman did not report the incident to the police but spoke to counselors about it; his parents later told Hollis, says the letter.

The letter also indicated that several weeks later, Associate Director of Sport Alan Haller met the woman and her mother after he and Hollis spoke to the coaching staff. Haller had stated that the incident had been discussed with "the basketball team". The letter said: "None of the players have been reprimanded in any way."

Earlier this year, ESPN had submitted several questions regarding Allswede's letter to Guerrant, who stated that the general content of the letter was not disputed and that the directors "would treat it differently" if such an allegation were made. today.

Izzo said Thursday that he had been talking about "everything" with NCAA investigators over the past year, but he did not want to go back over the details of those conversations. The NCAA closed its investigation into the state of Michigan's football and basketball programs in August and told the university that she had found no violations of the rules of the NCAA.

Izzo said that he was "insulted" by the idea that he would not remove the players guilty of sexual assault from his program.