Allegations swirling...

[godanesgo99]

I'm still of the opinion, that if it happened they way I understand that it happened, DK has nothing to show remorse for or to apologize further for. 

Wish there was a way to know what really happened. Like players that witnessed it telling their side of the story. 

Will witnesses be called to testify? This would go a long way to helping me form a better informed opinion

 

[Eli]

9 hours ago, godanesgo99 said:

I'm still of the opinion, that if it happened they way I understand that it happened, DK has nothing to show remorse for or to apologize further for. 

Wish there was a way to know what really happened. Like players that witnessed it telling their side of the story. 

Will witnesses be called to testify? This would go a long way to helping me form a better informed opinion

 

Is Luke looking to get paid? Maybe. Waiting so long, etc. is definitely fishy and clearly he has an axe to grind and wants to ruin DK.

But DK was GOING TO BE FIRED before the 'community' (laughable) made Benson keep him by pressuring him (or he'd likely be labled a 'RaCiSt' for axe'ing a black coach for hitting a white player - again, laughable). CLEARLY DK had done f'ed up. BAD. He drew blood for petes sake! And he didn't report anything. Whether or not Luke continued to push this, UA should have handled this when it happened but neither DK (self-reporting) or the Univesity (following through with the axe) did the right thing. Because of THAT, the university and DK deserve everything they get. Luke isn't the issue here, it is UA and DK.

I don't understand your stance...

[UA'08]

20 minutes ago, Eli said:

Is Luke looking to get paid? Maybe. Waiting so long, etc. is definitely fishy and clearly he has an axe to grind and wants to ruin DK.

But DK was GOING TO BE FIRED before the 'community' (laughable) made Benson keep him by pressuring him (or he'd likely be labled a 'RaCiSt' for axe'ing a black coach for hitting a white player - again, laughable). CLEARLY DK had done f'ed up. BAD. He drew blood for petes sake! And he didn't report anything. Whether or not Luke continued to push this, UA should have handled this when it happened but neither DK (self-reporting) or the Univesity (following through with the axe) did the right thing. Because of THAT, the university and DK deserve everything they get. Luke isn't the issue here, it is UA and DK.

I don't understand your stance...

He’s being charged with 4th degree assault, where the victim has no visible injuries. Drawing blood would be visible so I don’t understand this part. 

[cwdickens]

16 minutes ago, UA'08 said:

He’s being charged with 4th degree assault, where the victim has no visible injuries. Drawing blood would be visible so I don’t understand this part. 

My understanding from previous postings, the open hand slap across broke stitches inside Luke's mouth, perhaps the blood was not visible. 

[cwdickens]

10 hours ago, godanesgo99 said:

I'm still of the opinion, that if it happened they way I understand that it happened, DK has nothing to show remorse for or to apologize further for. 

Wish there was a way to know what really happened. Like players that witnessed it telling their side of the story. 

Will witnesses be called to testify? This would go a long way to helping me form a better informed opinion

 

Players .... what about the four assistant coaches who could not get of town fast enough .... in Florida and Indiana ...

[dslyank]

Luke isn't the issue here, it is UA and DK 

DISAGREE 100%. Luke is absolutely the issue for many reason. If he WAS assaulted in any meaningful way he should have reported right away. I can list other reasons like no corroborating evidence & more. 
Also the statement that DK was ready to be fired has NEVER been confirmed by a single source. If Fiz had an issue with the coach, team or school why wait months to report. And only AFTER he assumed or found out he had no future at UA. Spoiled grapes 100 % . I hope he doesn’t det a dime and hope UA & coach are exonerated. (Everyone except Benson of course. )

Edited January 24, 2023 by dslyank

[Eli]

1 hour ago, dslyank said:

Luke isn't the issue here, it is UA and DK 

DISAGREE 100%. Luke is absolutely the issue for many reason. If he WAS assaulted in any meaningful way he should have reported right away. I can list other reasons like no corroborating evidence & more. 
Also the statement that DK was ready to be fired has NEVER been confirmed by a single source. If Fiz had an issue with the coach, team or school why wait months to report. And only AFTER he assumed or found out he had no future at UA. Spoiled grapes 100 % . I hope he doesn’t det a dime and hope UA & coach are exonerated. (Everyone except Benson of course. )

Sorry, I guess I meant that Luke is LESS of the issue here. DK is the adult. He should have self-reported immediately. He didn't. Benson should have taken action immediately. He didn't and waffled (or whatever the term I'm looking for is). The ADULTS have more to do with this whole mess than the immature kid.

[Ron]

DK was suspended for four games.  Something happened.

[godanesgo99]

4 hours ago, Eli said:

Is Luke looking to get paid? Maybe. Waiting so long, etc. is definitely fishy and clearly he has an axe to grind and wants to ruin DK.

But DK was GOING TO BE FIRED before the 'community' (laughable) made Benson keep him by pressuring him (or he'd likely be labled a 'RaCiSt' for axe'ing a black coach for hitting a white player - again, laughable). CLEARLY DK had done f'ed up. BAD. He drew blood for petes sake! And he didn't report anything. Whether or not Luke continued to push this, UA should have handled this when it happened but neither DK (self-reporting) or the Univesity (following through with the axe) did the right thing. Because of THAT, the university and DK deserve everything they get. Luke isn't the issue here, it is UA and DK.

I don't understand your stance...

As someone else mentioned ... the case says no visible evidence of assault. This is why I do not believe that he was hit so hard it drew blood. I have posted many times here that while I agree that a coach should not "assault" a player. I am not against all physical contact between coaches and players. If they were playing a scrimmage with coaches and assistants vs the players for fun and a player got hurt because he was boxed out or was knocked over during an offensive charge - would that be an assault?

The team had won exactly 0 games before the game in question. A team that clearly had athleticism and talent was playing soft and lazy. The coach had to do something to fire up his team. According to the official story that I have read/heard: it was in the pregame talk in the locker room and he was challenging his players. He was telling them they needed to play angry. He was getting in their face and being the bad guy to get their adrenaline up. He was screaming. In this "pep" talk he shoved Luke (and probably other players as well) in order to get them to play mad. Apparently when he shoved Luke, he hit the locker. 

The team won that game for their first win of the season. Luke played 4 minutes in that game, but did not get any stats that would enter the scorebook. 

Maybe shoving the players was inappropriate, but based on the official story, it does not sound like assault. In fact, it doesn't even seem like anything that I would be angry about. Maybe he should have yelled and then utilized one of the captains to do the shoving to get each other fired up instead of doing it himself, but I see absolutely nothing wrong with this at all. These are adults that are going to battle together and should be able to take a little pushing and shoving. Unless Luke was actually hurt in the altercation, I don't even see anything that the coach/team should have reported. It was part of a closed door team meeting. Luke wasn't really hurt because he played 4 minutes in the game. This should be a non-issue. Luke didn't report the incident himself or have any complaints until he learned he wasn't going to get a scholarship for the following season. Actually recruiting for the following year hadn't even started yet, so he still could have gotten a scholarship, but it wasn't a guarantee. 

So you don't have to "understand my stance" because we are all entitled to our opinions. My stance could be 100% wrong and is fluid.  As more and more details of what actually happened come into the public light, I could change my opinion. Maybe coach singled him out and actually assaulted him and the official story is a lie. I don't know. What I do know, is that the way the official story has been explained to me, this feels like a spoiled kid not getting his way and now being out for a payday because he didn't collect his trophy for showing up. 

Should DK be fired? Maybe, but IMHO the reasons for dismissal are not this lawsuit - it would be for failure to coach what seems like an extremely talented team well enough for them to be competitive in the America East. 

Edited January 24, 2023 by godanesgo99

[Clickclack]

On 1/24/2023 at 1:04 PM, godanesgo99 said:

As someone else mentioned ... the case says no visible evidence of assault. This is why I do not believe that he was hit so hard it drew blood. I have posted many times here that while I agree that a coach should not "assault" a player. I am not against all physical contact between coaches and players. If they were playing a scrimmage with coaches and assistants vs the players for fun and a player got hurt because he was boxed out or was knocked over during an offensive charge - would that be an assault?

The team had won exactly 0 games before the game in question. A team that clearly had athleticism and talent was playing soft and lazy. The coach had to do something to fire up his team. According to the official story that I have read/heard: it was in the pregame talk in the locker room and he was challenging his players. He was telling them they needed to play angry. He was getting in their face and being the bad guy to get their adrenaline up. He was screaming. In this "pep" talk he shoved Luke (and probably other players as well) in order to get them to play mad. Apparently when he shoved Luke, he hit the locker. 

The team won that game for their first win of the season. Luke played 4 minutes in that game, but did not get any stats that would enter the scorebook. 

Maybe shoving the players was inappropriate, but based on the official story, it does not sound like assault. In fact, it doesn't even seem like anything that I would be angry about. Maybe he should have yelled and then utilized one of the captains to do the shoving to get each other fired up instead of doing it himself, but I see absolutely nothing wrong with this at all. These are adults that are going to battle together and should be able to take a little pushing and shoving. Unless Luke was actually hurt in the altercation, I don't even see anything that the coach/team should have reported. It was part of a closed door team meeting. Luke wasn't really hurt because he played 4 minutes in the game. This should be a non-issue. Luke didn't report the incident himself or have any complaints until he learned he wasn't going to get a scholarship for the following season. Actually recruiting for the following year hadn't even started yet, so he still could have gotten a scholarship, but it wasn't a guarantee. 

So you don't have to "understand my stance" because we are all entitled to our opinions. My stance could be 100% wrong and is fluid.  As more and more details of what actually happened come into the public light, I could change my opinion. Maybe coach singled him out and actually assaulted him and the official story is a lie. I don't know. What I do know, is that the way the official story has been explained to me, this feels like a spoiled kid not getting his way and now being out for a payday because he didn't collect his trophy for showing up. 

Should DK be fired? Maybe, but IMHO the reasons for dismissal are not this lawsuit - it would be for failure to coach what seems like an extremely talented team well enough for them to be competitive in the America East. 

On what planet is this team extremely talented? Seriously...on what planet? 

[dslyank]

On 1/24/2023 at 12:33 PM, Ron said:

DK was suspended for four games.  Something happened.

Again you are assuming him quilty without hearing the facts or know what witnesses say or not say (as far as I know no one on this blog has the facts). Perhaps the suspension was simply a pre-deal so an innocent person could go on with his life? The prisons are full of people who take a deal for a shorter sentence rather than face what is often a biased system. Perhaps DK was suspended for not reporting an incident when he never felt or even knew “something happened.”

Not saying any of this is the case? Only saying let’s hear the witnesses & get the facts before saying “something happened.”

[Dane Pound]

On 1/24/2023 at 11:24 AM, dslyank said:

Also the statement that DK was ready to be fired has NEVER been confirmed by a single source. If Fiz had an issue with the coach, team or school why wait months to report. And only AFTER he assumed or found out he had no future at UA. Spoiled grapes 100 % . I hope he doesn’t det a dime and hope UA & coach are exonerated. (Everyone except Benson of course. )

I don't know if it's confirmation but the community leaders who rallied for Coach Killings said they were there because he was going to fired.

[cwdickens]

3 hours ago, dslyank said:

Again you are assuming him quilty without hearing the facts or know what witnesses say or not say (as far as I know no one on this blog has the facts). Perhaps the suspension was simply a pre-deal so an innocent person could go on with his life? The prisons are full of people who take a deal for a shorter sentence rather than face what is often a biased system. Perhaps DK was suspended for not reporting an incident when he never felt or even knew “something happened.”

Not saying any of this is the case? Only saying let’s hear the witnesses & get the facts before saying “something happened.”

Please use the following link to the University press release which has an attachment to the letter in which Coach Killings offers his apology for his inappropriate contact with a student-athlete and failure to report the incident.

University at Albany Statement on the Men’s Basketball Program

Coach Killings is a well-educated and better than average compensated person which allowed him to not only retained an attorney; he also retained a local PR Team to assist him in keeping his position.

[dslyank]

12 hours ago, Dane Pound said:

I don't know if it's confirmation but the community leaders who rallied for Coach Killings said they were there because he was going to fired.

Sorry, but this is most definitely wrong. In an interview on channel 13 news;  Dr. Alice Green is the Executive Director of the Center for Law and Justice, said and I para-phrase that the alliance did in no way want to interfere in the investigation; but just wanted to insure that DK was not treated "un-fairly." Pretty sure the word fired was never spoken by any member of the alliance. And as far as I can recall no-one @ UA ever used the term or gave any indication that DK was being fired or dismissed. The only place either of these terms appeared formally were in an article by our friends from the TU; and by people on this blog.

Alice Green's words were most likely political speak; and I am sure the group wished DK was NOT fired; but I am also sure they never said, demanded or such words. Only that the investigation treat him FAIRLY.

[Clickclack]

57 minutes ago, dslyank said:

Sorry, but this is most definitely wrong. In an interview on channel 13 news;  Dr. Alice Green is the Executive Director of the Center for Law and Justice, said and I para-phrase that the alliance did in no way want to interfere in the investigation; but just wanted to insure that DK was not treated "un-fairly." Pretty sure the word fired was never spoken by any member of the alliance. And as far as I can recall no-one @ UA ever used the term or gave any indication that DK was being fired or dismissed. The only place either of these terms appeared formally were in an article by our friends from the TU; and by people on this blog.

Alice Green's words were most likely political speak; and I am sure the group wished DK was NOT fired; but I am also sure they never said, demanded or such words. Only that the investigation treat him FAIRLY.

I'll point out that there is zero verifiable proof that the University ever reached a decision to fire DK. The only place we've ever heard this is in the lawsuit, an unsubstantiated allegation and the linchpin to Fiz's entire claim that pressure was applied to keep him and that pressure was applied to the investigation. I suspect the Universities lawyers will go after this very hard, demanding proof of this allegation. If this falls apart, the case craks...IMO.