UMBC Suspends 5 Lacrosse Players After Alleged Text Threats

A former John Carroll lacrosse captain was among five women suspended from the UMBC lacrosse team this week amid allegations of text messages threatening harm upon the team’s freshmen, according to reports.

Mackenzie Reese, 19, who was the captain of the John Carroll lacrosse team before graduating in 2013, is quoted in one text message obtained by the Baltimore Post-Examiner as saying of her teammate: “I’m only aiming for her [expletive] shins and...then I’ll aim for her…head and we all know that head of hers is worthless anyway.”

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The alleged statement was part of a group chat among several UMBC women’s lacrosse players using chat app “GroupMe” to discuss their distaste for the freshmen players in a recent conversation entitled “Sophomores Rule,” the Post-Examiner reported.

One message reportedly said about the freshmen on the team, “Can we just kill them?” according to WJZ.

A tipster sent photos of the group chat to several media outlets on Friday; and by Saturday, the university said it had suspended the players for a “violation of team rules,” Lacrosse Magazine reported.

University officials identified the suspended players as Reese, Amber Kovalick, Britanny Marquess, Meghan Milani and Alyssa Semones, according to ABC 2 News.

They have been placed on an indefinite suspension, Lacrosse Magazine reported. For the past two games, the women have not played, according to WBAL. The women’s lacrosse program is now under review by the university, WJZ reported.

UMBC officials said they were working together with the athletics department “to fully understand the situation and support our student athletes,” according to The Baltimore Sun.

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The suspensions come on the heels of another controversy involving alleged maltreatment among students at the university.

Two students were expelled from UMBC for violating the student code of conduct after another student alleged she was gang-raped in a dorm in August, UMBC’s student newspaper The Retriever Weekly reported on Friday.

Police investigated the incident, which involved four men and a woman who learned she had been gang raped when someone told her about it in October, The Baltimore Sun reported. Authorities in Baltimore County told the newspaper that nobody was charged because there was not enough evidence to show that a crime had occurred.

UPDATE: The five women who were suspended from the lacrosse team issued a statement Tuesday saying they were “deeply sorry.” Read it here.