Sports
Meet Dragan Kesich, the nation’s most colorful kicker
FALCON HEIGHTS, Minn. — About 20 minutes after walking into opening day at the Minnesota State Fair, with microphone in hand, fanny pack around his waist, and baseball cap covering the faded “Monsters, Inc.” character painted on his head, Dragan Kesich wanders past the line for Pronto Pups corn dogs. He says he smells camels. Or cows. Or something.
It’s probably horses. Mostly horses, anyway. The 27,500-square-foot barn is off to the right.
“Ooh, you wanna go see some horses?” Kesich suggests to the small group tailing him. “Let’s see some horses.”
Nearly 2 million people will attend this 12-day spectacle. The country’s most colorful kicker, a 6-foot-4, 240-pound left-footer who thinks he could beat a cheetah in a fight, is one of one. He records an episode of his preseason vlog, “Kamp With Kesich,” in which fairgoers must correctly pronounce the names of three teammates to win a Gophers towel. He rides the Rock Star, discusses Brett Favre with a total stranger, sits in the audience for a taping of P.J. Fleck’s coach’s show, eats a turkey leg, takes pictures with fans, plots a stop at Sweet Martha’s Cookie Jar and tries to win a stuffed animal for the fifth straight year. For two hours, Dragan Kesich happens to the State Fair, and not the other way around.
“He’s the most interesting guy I’ve ever met in my life, I reckon, by a mile,” says Minnesota punter Mark Crawford, who, at age 30, has lived a bit.
There is, unavoidably, a binary side to Kesich’s existence. Make or miss. Black or white. He’ll feel that acutely nine days from this moment. And it’s up to him to be a light, even when things get a little dark.
For now, Kesich loops through the horse barn, marveling at the Clydesdales while also trying to interview one. Upon finding an empty stall, he walks in to explore it. Linebacker Cody Lindenberg, one of his best friends, then spies a nearby stack of bales.
“You’re not feeding me hay, bro,” Kesich declares. “We’re not doing that.”
In moments, the reigning Big Ten kicker of the year gnaws at a handful of hay strands.
Upon leaving the barn, Kesich visits a smoothie stand and orders a palate-cleansing Strawberry Squeeze. He makes one additional request.
“Can I get the Tiki cup?” he asks.
It’s Aug. 29, 2024. Two seconds left against North Carolina. Minnesota trails by two and Dragan Kesich has another chance to win a season opener with a 47-yard field goal. This is how he began his breakout 2023 season, too: same distance, tie game against Nebraska, three seconds on the clock, and the kick split the uprights. Everyone thought he’d make that one. Everyone knew he’d make this one. And the ball leaves Kesich’s foot and hooks wide right.
He walks off the Huntington Bank Stadium field, head hung low. Teammates console him. Fleck declares unwavering belief during a postgame news conference. Still, in the locker room, the glow drains from one of college football’s most vibrant personalities … for a while.
Around 1 a.m., Kesich decides to be in a happy place.
“Let’s go to Taco Bell,” he declares to his roommates.
The tradition started in 2021 with Crawford and linebacker Derik LeCaptain. After every game, whatever time it is, they decompress at a nearby Taco Bell. This night would be no different. Kesich would be gutted, then stuff his gut with a Cheesy Gordita Crunch box. “You can’t ride the emotional roller coaster as a kicker,” he says. “Let’s say I would’ve made that kick. I can’t act any differently, you feel me? I just gotta be who I am.”
It’s how a human kaleidoscope does this job. How he makes his way through missing as many kicks (four) in the first four games of 2024 as he did in all of 2023. There are people in the world trying to be what they’re supposed to be, Fleck muses. Or they try to be different. His kicker does not try. Dragan Kesich is, the Gophers coach says, “100 percent authentic,” no matter what.
Let us count the ways.
The family history. Kesich’s great-grandfather was bound for Belgrade, Serbia, for work when the Croatian army stopped his train. The Serbians were pulled off the train, tied together in pairs and thrown into a pit with water at the bottom. Kesich’s great-grandfather caught hold of something – “My grandpa said a tree branch,” Kesich says – and held on until dark. He then climbed out and was rescued by the Serbian army.
In the mid-1990s, with war seizing the region, his grandparents fled on a seven-day tractor ride from Golubic, a village in the city of Knin, Croatia, to Belgrade. They flew back to America. A bomb fell on their house not long after. Harrowing stuff. But there’s something about having steel in your blood. “It doesn’t feel real,” Kesich says. “I’m like, I don’t know how you guys went through that.”
The soccer punt. By eighth grade, Kesich began to take kicking seriously enough to start getting noticed. There was still the matter of his family’s love for soccer – Kesich says he has a plaque for scoring 100 goals in one season as a youth player, and his brother played at Division II Wisconsin-Parkside – until a fateful coaching change at Oak Creek (Wis.) High. The new boys soccer coach made running two miles in 12 minutes mandatory for training. This prompted Kesich’s early retirement. “And, of course, they didn’t even end up doing it,” he says now. “I was like, well, that was just a tactic to get a guy like me out of there. So it worked.”
The hair. For the sake of change, Kesich decided to bleach his hair in 2022. At practice, Fleck offered a thought: It was a blank canvas. Kesich should paint it.
Kesich commissioned Crawford’s then-girlfriend, an art major, for the work. The first design was flames. Then, a cheetah print. Pokemon Go was big with Minnesota football in early 2023, so Squirtle – “a great Pokemon,” Kesich notes – appeared on his dome. There has been a blue arrow inspired by “Avatar: The Last Airbender,” a playing-card theme and, lastly, the face of Mike Wazowski from “Monsters, Inc.” It’s been a preseason-only ritual, and not accidentally, it’s created some levity for a group in need of it during the grind. “How easy is it to go up and have a conversation with the guy who’s got Mike Wazowski from ‘Monsters, Inc.’ painted in his hair?” LeCaptain says.
(Courtesy of University of Minnesota)
Miscellaneous Dragan tales. To begin with, it’s pronounced Drag-AHN, but people call him “Dragon” anyway. Kesich took a bowling class at Minnesota, decided to buy his own ball and says he’s rolled a high game of 244. He spent the bulk of a Saturday night three years ago attempting to break the record on a Pop-A-Shot machine in the players’ lounge, while LeCaptain cheered him on. (He did set the record.) He loves animated movies and spent a recent off-day rewatching “Ratatouille” and “The Incredibles.” He is an avid sleeper who once asked Crawford to wake him up shortly before a massage appointment. “It was like 9:30 at night,” the punter says. The massage was at 12:55 p.m. the next day.
When Kesich discovered his beloved Milwaukee Bucks were using Minnesota’s basketball facility for a workout, he dropped everything, donned a green Bucks jumpsuit and waited outside for autographs. Only Giannis Antetokounmpo turned him down.
“He’s a kid at heart,” Crawford says, “but it’s a big heart, that’s for sure.”
The Great Animal Fight Debate. One day, as they are wont to do, Kesich and Crawford started a locker room discussion about a dumb topic: Wild animals you could defeat in a fight.
An elephant was a no. So were lions and giraffes and grizzly bears, though Kesich added an asterisk to black bears. “Because black bears eat fruit,” he reasons. Then someone brought up a cheetah. Binary challenge. Him and a carnivore from the wilds of Africa. Do or die.
Guess where Dragan Kesich landed on that.
“If it’s to the death? I think I could,” Kesich says. “There’s the cheetah. I’m right here. Like, my life depends on it. I think I could take it. … Hopefully I’m never in that position. But if I am, I think I can come out victorious.”
He may indeed be, as his buddies put it, delusional. But there’s a reason Dragan Kesich is in the middle of everything for Minnesota and not a sideshow.
Because the stories don’t end there.
Here’s the other thing Kesich once was: a pudgy teenager with a big leg but not enough accuracy to be a reliable Big Ten kicker.
“He looked a little bit more like a high school right guard,” Fleck says of Kesich, the prospect. He weighed in at 270 pounds after arriving at Minnesota. Little of it could be considered good weight. “It was not a good place,” Kesich concedes.
So he started running again. He quit drinking soda. He cut out Twix bars as a bedtime snack, among other processed-sugar temptations. All that and the dedicated conditioning program for Gophers specialists shaved 40 pounds off his frame. Dragan Kesich got serious and quickly worked his way into looking like a college football player.
Performing like one took longer.
As a true freshman in 2020, Kesich only handled kickoffs. What might’ve been an open door for 2021 closed to a crack in the offseason: Minnesota plucked Matthew Trickett, an all-MAC kicker from Kent State, out of the transfer portal. Kesich was happy to let the best man win the job. He was less thrilled when that wasn’t him. “I was like, dang, maybe they don’t believe in me, maybe they don’t trust me here,” he says. Trickett attempted 43 field goals over the next two seasons. Kesich attempted one. Understanding why that happened was precisely what Kesich needed. “I learned so much under him in those two years,” he says of Trickett now. “He got me to where I am.”
Kesich obsessed over consistency in his approach, staying light on his feet, getting his placement right. If he wasn’t spending hours working with his kicking coach, Luke Radke, when home in Wisconsin, he was texting Radke for drills to do behind the curtain at Minnesota. He learned how to manage his temperament. He won the starting job for 2023 and connected on 23 of 27 attempts, without missing an extra point. Everyone remembers the Nebraska winner, but Kesich is prouder of his four makes in an upset win at Iowa. The Big Ten kicker of the year award was a validation – “It’s something you never think would happen,” Kesich says – but it was also trimming. For years, the light was there only if he squinted. He marched toward it anyway and now is the program’s all-time leader in field goals from 50 yards and beyond.
That’s how a kicker works his way into the heart of everything.
“He’s one of the most influential leaders on our team, and it’s not even a question,” LeCaptain says.
Part of it is acting like the life of an everyday party and the magnetism that creates. But the blue water bottle Minnesota players must carry around in training camp as a reminder to hydrate? Kesich carries it all season. If lyrics get a little profane over the locker room speaker system, Kesich shuts off the music, lest it offend someone passing through the building. Should a player challenge him on that, well, he’s a 6-4, 240-pound guy who knows the rules. “You don’t see that,” Lindenberg says. “You don’t really see kickers as involved. He’s holding people accountable. He’s doing all the right things.”
Says Fleck: “He’s different from the normal perception of what a kicker is mentally and emotionally. He is a football player. That’s what makes him so connected to our team.”
With things to straighten out in every sense, and with rival Iowa visiting last weekend, Kesich got to work. Again. He focused on finishing his motion downfield. Keeping his club (left) foot open longer. Keeping his eyes back so his hips didn’t turn as much. He even wondered if anyone would let him bring the Floyd of Rosedale trophy to Taco Bell if Minnesota won.
There would be no reprise of 2023. Again. Kesich didn’t attempt a field goal in a 31-14 loss, much less make four. But here comes Michigan, the defending national champions. Such is the life. Another week, and he has to believe the light is out there somewhere.
“A quarterback, they’ve got, what, 40 throws a game?” Kesich says. “A kicker, you got two on average a game? So when you miss one it’s kind of just like that: All right, boom, whatever, next one. I’d say I’ve always had that.”
Dragan Kesich celebrates with P. J. Fleck after defeating Nebraska in the 2023 season opener. (Bailey Hillesheim / Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)
At 10:58 a.m., a throng of large humans in matching gold T-shirts and maroon shorts enters the Minnesota State Fair through a gate off Randall Avenue. Without much ado, Dragan Kesich sorts through some papers with his teammates’ names on them, separating the easy ones to pronounce from the hard ones, and collects a few Gophers to stand behind him as he records an intro for this “Kamp With Kesich” featurette.
He tells everyone to enjoy the ride.
And we’re off.
“Last time, I rode the slingshot – you know the one that shoots you into the air?” Kesich says, walking past lampposts affixed with “12 Days of Fun” banners. “I’m never doing that again.”
So there are places past the edge of the map in Dragan’s world, but only because he’s already visited and doesn’t want to go back.
Most everything else, today and every day, is fair game.
Kesich cracks up when he sees offensive linemen trying on samurai hats. (“We gotta get that.”) He notes how convenient Sweet Martha’s, with its literal buckets of chocolate chip cookies, is to the way out. (“We’ll get those later. I gotta savor those.”) He wonders aloud if a kid walking around with a recorder can play “Hot Cross Buns.” He talks Packers and Vikings with a complete stranger who has a very complicated and somewhat unintelligible theory about Brett Favre, locked into the conversation the whole time. He does not cut the first two “Kamp With Kesich” contestants any slack for mispronouncing the third and most difficult name he gives them, though the one who can’t get “Oberhiri Eyafe” correct walks away unaware that he has company.
“Guys, I gotta be honest,” Kesich says, after moving along. “I have no idea how to pronounce Obie’s name.”
After touring the horse barn, he tells a woman who asks for a picture that it’ll cost her 50 bucks, and then bursts out laughing. He hands out a prize to a fairgoer who gets Eyafe as the third name to pronounce – “Give him his towel, baby!” – while also conceding he still has no idea if it was right. After 40 minutes of this, Kesich’s attention turns to the Mighty Midway, and he asks Lindenberg if he wants to go on the Rock Star. Lindenberg says the pendulum-like ride isn’t good enough.
A couple minutes later, the Rock Star line comprises four people: Two kids, and two Big Ten football players.
“You ever been on this ride?” Kesich asks one of the boys in front of him. “Let me tell you, it’s the greatest thing ever. Best thing you’ll ever do in your life.”
Upon descending the ride platform – “That was amazing,” Kesich reports – he calculates there is enough time to win a stuffed animal. He’s 4-for-4 in bringing one back for support staff member Chandler Buning. He cannot leave here without a fifth. Which brings him to a football-throwing game.
One toss. Fit it through a star-shaped hole, get a prize. Make or miss. All or nothing.
First toss is high. Second is, too. Third goes low.
“What am I doing?” Kesich shouts.
His luck does not improve, nor does his mood. So Kesich moves next door to the Cat Rack. Knock over three feline-shaped targets with baseballs, and he can complete his mission with an elephant or frog or purple panda.
All or nothing, again.
He doesn’t win on his first turn, or his second.
“Run it back, run it back,” he says.
He hits two and misses the third.
“DUDE!” Kesich exclaims. “Run it back!”
He misses all three throws. On the next try, he connects on just one. He is both beside himself and out of time, if he wants to catch Fleck’s coaches’ show.
“All right,” Kesich tells the Cat Rack proprietor. “I’ll be back with $100.”
It only takes 70. And it’s a different game, two booths away, with slightly lower stakes: three throws to knock over beer bottles, but the prize increases in size with every successful consecutive try.
Kesich never goes 3-for-3, but he does hit one a bunch of times and two in a row twice. So Buning gets a gray elephant to keep the streak alive. Kesich gives Lindenberg a panda to pass on to his girlfriend. He hands out the smaller prizes to random people at the fair. Mission accomplished.
There is belief, and there is stubbornness, and there is Dragan Kesich, coloring in the overlap.
(Illustration: Meech Robinson / The Athletic; photos courtesy of University of Minnesota)
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Venezuela defeated Team USA, 3-2, in the World Baseball Classic (WBC) final Tuesday, and the game was historic in more ways than one.
Venezuela won its first-ever WBC title, and players flooded the field with emotion and pride as they celebrated the thrilling victory.
History was also made during the telecast when 10,784,000 viewers watched the final on FOX and FOX Deportes.
It became the most-watched WBC telecast of all time.
Fox Sports broadcaster Tom Verducci interviews MVP Maikel Garcia of Venezuela and his translator after a 3-2 victory against the United States at loanDepot Park March 17, 2026, in Miami, Fla. (Al Bello/Getty Images)
The telecast averaged 10,228,000 viewers, while hitting its peak at 12,148,000 from 10:30-10:45 p.m. ET on FOX.
This number was up 128% from the Team USA-Japan WBC final on FS1 during the 2023 tournament, when Shohei Ohtani struck out Mike Trout to seal a third WBC win for his country.
TRUMP RAISES EYEBROWS WITH ‘STATEHOOD’ COMMENT AFTER VENEZUELA BEATS THE US IN WORLD BASEBALL CLASSIC
While this game had all the thrills, the WBC turned out to be an exciting tournament from the very start with pool play.
Whether it was feel-good stories like Ondřej Satoria’s standing ovation from Japanese fans at the Tokyo Dome during his final outing for Czechia or Italy’s espresso machine home run celebration, viewers from all over were tuning in to watch magic happen on the diamond.
Fox Sports broadcaster Tom Verducci interviews manager Omar López Team Venezuela after a 3-2 victory against the United States at loanDepot park March 17, 2026, in Miami, Fla. (Megan Briggs/Getty Images)
The tournament averaged 1,294,000 viewers across FOX, FS1 and FS2, making it the most-watched WBC in its 20-year history on English language networks.
It looked like Venezuela was going to shut out Team USA, which had just two hits and four base runners in the bottom of the eighth inning when Bryce Harper walked to the plate.
The game turned on its head when Harper belted a two-run homer to tie the game during the peak viewing window.
Venezuela, though, never blinked. Eugenio Suarez hit a rope to left-center field, scoring the game-winning run with a double.
Members of Team Venezuela celebrate with their gold medals after defeating the United States 3-2 at loanDepot Park March 17, 2026, in Miami, Fla. (Al Bello/Getty Images)
Daniel Palencia closed things out for Venezuela, sealing the win with a strikeout of Roman Anthony. The party ensued for Venezuela at loanDepot Park.
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Thursday’s Results
BASEBALL
CITY SECTION
North Hollywood 5, Granada Hills Kennedy 3
Sun Valley Poly 11, Sylmar 9
Verdugo Hills 5, San Fernando 3
WISH Academy 11, Washington Prep 5
SOUTHERN SECTION
Adelanto 6, Granite Hills 4
Alhambra 10, Schurr 2
Animo Leadership 6, Compton Early College 3
Arroyo 14, Glendale 0
Banning 9, Yucca Valley 8
Beverly Hills 13, Lennox Academy 3
Bloomington 10, Carter 0
Buckley 7, Santa Monica Pacifica Christian 6
Campbell Hall 6, Brentwood 1
Chaparral 8, Citrus Valley 3
Charter Oak 3, El Rancho 2
Chino 7, Don Lugo 1
Compton Centennial 7, Lawndale 5
Covina 9, Pasadena Marshall 8
Diamond Ranch 5, Chaffey 4
Eisenhower 2, Colton 1
Environmental Charter 13, Ambassador 6
Etiwanda 2, Santa Ana Foothill 0
Gabrielino 23, Southlands Christian 4
Garden Grove 14, Rancho Alamitos 1
Glendora 14, Western Christian 3
Grace 29, Santa Clara 2
Grand Terrace 12, Arroyo Valley 0
Heritage Christian 12, Village Christian 1
La Mirada 7, Aliso Niguel 1
La Quinta 11, Rancho Mirage 0
Leuzinger 4, Culver City 3
Maranatha 12, Whittier Christian 4
Milken 4, Burbank Providence 1
Montebello 18, San Gabriel 0
Newbury Park 7, Buena 1
Norwalk 8, Sante Fe 3
Ontario 6, Montclair 3
Orange County Pacifica Christian 7, Laguna Beach 4
Palm Springs 17, Xavier Prep 4
Palo Verde 8, Bellflower 7
Redlands 15, Hesperia Christian 0
Redlands East Valley 18, Silverado 1
Rolling Hills Prep 13, HMSA 4
Rowland 3, Diamond Bar 1
San Juan Hills 11, Riverside Prep 10
Santa Clarita Christian 4, Desert Christian 0
Santa Monica 8, Calabasas 4
Santa Rosa Academy 9, San Jacinto Valley Academy 8
Shadow Hills 5, Palm Desert 3
South Hills 11, Los Altos 3
Summit 5, Rialto 1
Temecula Prep 14, SJDLCS 1
Temecula Valley 11, Trabuco Hills 0
Temescal Canyon 5, San Dimas 3
Trinity Classical Academy 7, Castaic 3
Twentynine Palms 4, AAE 2
Victory Valley 4, Barstow 3
Webb 16 La Puente 2
West Torrance 9, New Roads 0
West Valley 14, San Jacinto 4
INTERSECTIONAL
Borrego Springs 12, Anza Hamilton 0
Colorado Legend 10, La Habra 5
Eagle Rock 19, CALS Early College 1
Fullerton 14, Colorado Mullen 4
Gahr 7, Utah American Fork 1
Inglewood 16, Dorsey 1
St. Pius X-St. Matthias Academy 7, Port of LA 4
WISH Academy 11, Washington Prep 5
SOFTBALL
CITY SECTION
Animo Robinson 24, Animo Watts 14
Bell 11, Huntington Park 6
Bernstein 25, Contreras 12
Central City Value 18, Vaughn 14
Dorsey 21, Dymally 0
East Valley 20, Panorama 4
Garfield 6, LA Roosevelt 2
Hollywood 18, Belmont 5
Mendez 20, Roybal 8
SOCES 15, Northridge Academy 4
Triumph Charter 19, Bert Corona 1
Westchester 15, Narbonne 13
SOUTHERN SECTION
Alhambra 16, Mark Keppel 0
Aliso Niguel 4, El Toro 1
Alta Loma 6, Citrus Valley 2
Arrowhead Christian 19, Woodcrest Christian 2
Barstow 4, Victor valley 2
Beaumont 7, Rancho Verde 1
Bonita 20, Claremont 6
California 5, Sante Fe 4
Cantwell-Sacred Heart 5, Bishop Conaty-Loretto 2
Castaic 13, Golden Valley 4
Chadwick 22, Westridge 1
Chaffey 9, Diamond Ranch 0
Chaminade 7, Sherman Oaks Notre Dame 6
Coastal Academy 9, Mayfield 0
Crescenta Valley 23, Hoover 0
Cypress 3, Segerstrom 0
Desert Christian Academy 11, California Military Institute 10
Don Lugo 3, Chino 2
Eastside 11, Littlerock 4
El Cajon Christian 8, Trabuco Hills 2
El Dorado 10, Mayfair 0
El Modena 9, La Habra 6
El Rancho 15, Arroyo 5
Fillmore 15, Channel Islands 4
Firebaugh 19, Hawthorne 13
Fontana 11, Bethel Christian 2
Foothill Tech 12, Bishop Diego 0
Fullerton 6, Los Altos 1
Garden Grove Pacifica 4, Anaheim Canyon 1
Gahr 10, Cerritos 0
Garden Grove 11, Westminster 1
Granite Hills 12, Adelanto 4
Hemet 16, United Christian Academy 5
Hesperia Christian 17, Immanuel Christian 2
Highland 2, Quartz Hill 1
Indio 18, Lakeside 1
Indio 14, Temecula Prep 1
Irvine University 9, San Marino 8
Jurupa Hills 16, San Gorgonio 0
Kaiser 14, Grand Terrace 5
Knight 14, Antelope Valley 1
Lakeside 7, San Jacinto 6
La Mirada 5, Valley Christian 0
La Quinta 10, Rancho Mirage 0
La Salle 13, Mary Star of the Sea 2
La Serna 16, Whittier 4
Lennox Academy 14, Compton Early College 8
Leuzinger 9, Culver City 6
Liberty 10, Linfield Christian 4
Los Alamitos 6, Huntington Beach 5
Marina 6, Edison 0
Millikan 9, Lakewood 0
Mira Costa 9, Bishop Montgomery 8
Mission Viejo 2, El Cajon Christian 1
Moorpark 14, Royal 2
Moreno Valley 9, Vista del Lago 6
Muir 18, Glendale 3
Murrieta Valley 15, Chaparral 5
Newport Harbor 7, Corona del Mar 4
North Torrance 6, Santa Monica 1
Northwood 8, Irvine 0
Oak Park 5, Camarillo 4
Ontario 5, Montclair 0
Oxnard 5, Buena 1
Paloma Valley 15, Tahquitz 2
Palos Verdes 4, El Segundo 0
Paraclete 9, Lakewood St. Joseph 4
Pasadena 19, Immaculate Heart 8
Pasadena Poly 10, Flintridge Prep 0
Rialto 18, Eisenhower 8
Ridgecrest Burroughs 31, Silver Valley 1
Riverside Notre Dame 6, United Christian Academy 0
Riverside Poly 2, Shadow Ridge 0
San Jacinto 15, Temecula Prep 1
San Juan Hills 8, Tesoro 5
Santa Ana Foothill 17, Esperanza 0
Santa Paula 18, Nordhoff 1
Saugus 3, Valencia 2
Schurr 25, San Gabriel 0
Shadow Hills 21, Palm Desert 14
Shadow Ridge 8, Louisville 4
Simi Valley 5, Newbury Park 4
St. Bernard d. San Gabriel Mission, forfeit
St. Bonaventure 20, Del Sol 0
St. Monica 16, St. Anthony 2
St. Paul 10, Bishop Amat 0
St. Pius X-St. Matthias Academy 18, Gardena Serra 5
Summit 20, Arroyo Valley 0
Temecula Valley 4, Great Oak 2
Viewpoint 10, Brentwood 0
Warren 9, La Palma Kennedy 1
West Covina 9, Southlands Christian 8
Western Christian 16, San Dimas 15
West Ranch 13, Canyon Country Canyon 4
Whittier Christian 3, Maranatha 1
Windward 11, Archer 8
Yucaipa 5, Rancho Cucamonga 3
Yucca Valley 19, Banning 9
INTERSECTIONAL
Anza Hamilton 10, Borrego Springs 0
Eagle Rock 6, Alemany 4
Harvard-Westlake 6, El Camino Real 3
Nevada Bishop Gorman 5, Mission Viejo 1
Nevada Spanish Springs 7, Carson 4
Rio Hondo Prep 3, San Diego 2
Riverside Poly 9, Nevada Reed 0
San Fernando 4, Tri-City Christian 3
Sierra Canyon 17, Nevada Douglas 0
Sierra Canyon 3, Nevada Reed 2
Sun Valley Magnet 7, Lakeview Charter 6
Thousand Oaks 9, Granada Hills 4
Torrance 7, Legacy 2
Trabuco Hills 4, Nevada Bishop Gorman 4
Utah Lehi 10, Carson 5
Sports
Former Wyoming volleyball star reveals how the SJSU trans scandal permanently ruined friendships on her team
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As San Jose State University approaches a critical deadline in its Title IX conflict against President Donald Trump’s administration, another woman who was affected by the school’s 2024 volleyball scandal has come forward.
Former University of Wyoming volleyball star Macey Boggs said her team had been “torn apart” over a decision of whether to forfeit two matches to SJSU in 2024. The Spartans were embroiled in a national controversy at that time due to the presence of a biological male transgender athlete on the roster.
Boggs said in a recent interview the players had found out about the trans player, whom they had competed against two years earlier, in the spring of 2024. When the fall rolled around, the locker room became a hive of tension and nerves due to the two scheduled matches between Wyoming and SJSU, and disagreements about whether to forfeit or not.
Former University of Wyoming volleyball star Macey Boggs (Courtesy of Macey Boggs)
“You could tell that things got a little bit hostile,” Boggs told Fox News Digital.
“In between the whispering between each other’s back, and then we were no longer one team, one unit, it was like these two separate islands.”
Friendships were permanently ruined for Boggs and the rest of the Cowgirls, she said.
“Yeah,” Boggs said when asked if the situation “permanently ruined friendships.”
“There were some of the girls who I really enjoyed, and we got along great, and then this situation came up, some conflict came up, and ultimately we went in separate directions because of that … as soon as we played in our last game, we all went in separate directions… it was hard to maintain those relationships.”
How did it get to that point?
The first Mountain West team to forfeit to SJSU that year was Utah State, becoming the first of five conference teams to do so.
Former Utah State star Kaylie Ray previously told Fox News Digital that the decision was left up to a player poll, and the majority of players voted to forfeit.
Wyoming also left the decision up to a player vote, per Boggs. But that vote had troubling outcome for her.
“It was said that it was up to the players. So we took an anonymous vote, it ended up we were going to play because most of the girls on my team wanted to play,” Boggs said. But she and others weren’t going to play anyway, regardless of the vote.
FORMER SJSU VOLLEYBALL STAR OPENS UP ON LIVING WITH TRANS TEAMMATE WITHOUT KNOWING ATHLETE’S BIOLOGICAL SEX
“There were a few of us who were like, ‘We’re not gonna play.’ So we decided we’re not gonna play. . . . There was a lot of conflict within the team . . . and it was not something you should have to deal with on your team. . . . It just seems so silly and something that tore apart the team.”
The divide came with several difficult conversations for Boggs.
But most of the conversations weren’t necessarily ideological, over whether males should be able to play in women’s sports. Boggs said the conversations were mostly about the pain of taking two losses on their record, when they were all working so hard to make the playoffs.
It was especially hard for the seniors.
“One of the hardest conversations, there were two, one of them was a fellow senior and she said, ‘This is my fellow senior year, I don’t want it to be ruined by this. And I fully resonated with that because it was also my senior year, and it was ruined by that,” Boggs said.
“One girl was doing really well statistically in the Mountain West and the NCAA and she mentioned, ‘how is this going to affect my stats?’ And that didn’t settle well for me because I was like, ‘OK, that’s kind of selfish.’
“I understood where she was coming from … but ultimately it’s a bigger issue.”
Boggs and the players who were determined not to play the game were preparing to tell the coaches of their intent.
But just then, prior to the first match between Wyoming and SJSU on Oct. 5 of that year, the players were called into another meeting, Boggs said.
‘HORRIBLE’ MOMENTS EXPOSED FOR UNR VOLLEYBALL PLAYERS WHEN THEY WERE ROPED INTO THE SJSU TITLE IX SCANDAL
Boggs claims that Wyoming Athletic Director Tom Burman told them they were encouraged by the Wyoming state government to forfeit the game, but Burman made the final decision on the forfeit
“By the time it was time to tell the coaches, we had another meeting… It was told to us by our AD Tom Burman, so he was the one who said, ‘this is the decision that has been made, it’s been taken out of your guys’ hands. And I’m so grateful for that,” Boggs said.
Fox News Digital has reached out to University of Wyoming Athletics and Wyoming Governor Mark Gordon’s office for a response.
Public records show the university faced “outside pressure” to forfeit the match, according to WyoFile.
Gordon commended the forfeit in a statement at the time.
“I am in full support of the decision by Wyoming Athletics to forego playing its volleyball match against San Jose State. It is important we stand for integrity and fairness in female athletics,” Gordon said.
The dispute was resolved. But the consequences remain.
Wyoming went on to finish the season 17-13, losing six of their last nine games. They finished two games out of the final spot in the conference tournament, and would have made the tournament had they won their two games against SJSU. It was Boggs and other seniors’ last chance to make the tournament in their Wyoming careers.
Within the locker room, the disagreements over initial vote left rifts. Boggs and the women on her side dug their heels in deeper.
In November of that year, Boggs and teammates Sierra Grizzle and Jordan Sandy joined former SJSU volleyball star Brooke Slusser’s lawsuit against the Mountain West Conference. Slusser initially brought the scandal into the national spotlight that September, when she joined Riley Gaines’ lawsuit against the NCAA, with Slusser citing her experience playing with and rooming with trans teammate Blaire Fleming without ever being officially told of Fleming’s birth sex.
Boggs, Grizzle and Sandy joined Slusser and seven other conference players in suing the Mountain West and representative of SJSU and the California State University (CSU) system.
Boggs said the decision to take things that far earned the respect of teammates who initially voted to play the game.
Once they joined, Boggs said she told her other teammates, “‘Hey, can we talk to you guys? We’ve decided to join this lawsuit, and this is why.”
“And after that, they like totally understood . . . I think that standing up for something can be extremely scary, and something you need to be very brave and bold in.”
FORMER COLLEGE VOLLEYBALL STAR KAYLIE RAY OPENS UP ON VIRAL CLASH WITH ARIZONA DEMOCRAT SENATOR
The Slusser v Mountain West lawsuit was partially dismissed by federal judge Kato Crews earlier in March, with all charges being dismissed against the Mountain West.
However, Title IX claims and representatives of SJSU and CSU were not dismissed. Crews is reserving a ruling on those charges until after the ruling in the ongoing B.P.J. v West Virginia Supreme Court case over trans athletes in women’s sports, and the Title IX implications.
At the same time, SJSU and CSU are waging a legal war of resistance to the Trump administration’s efforts to get SJSU to resolve its alleged Title IX violations for how it handled Fleming.
After the U.S. Department of Education announced an investigation determined that SJSU violated Title IX, and offered a series of compliance points to resolve it, SJSU and CSU sued the federal government to challenge the findings.
“I laughed,” Boggs said, when she heard the news of SJSU’s lawsuit. “That seems like something that is a little bit silly. I truly believe that we even shouldn’t be having lawsuits centered around men in women’s sports.”
U.S. Education Secretary Linda McMahon responded to the lawsuits on March 11, giving the institutions a deadline of 10 days to come to an agreement or risk federal funding cuts and a referral to the U.S. Department of Justice.
With that deadline coming up within a week, Boggs is the latest woman to have been impacted by the scandal to speak out about the experience, joining Slusser and Ray.
Both Slusser and Ray have gone viral on social media in recent weeks after speaking out, prompting criticism and even online insults from people with pro-transgender views.
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Boggs said she’s faced online attacks from the other side ever since her decision to forfeit and join the lawsuit in 2024, and she is prepared to face more, if necessary.
“I will bare the weight all day, I will take any hate that has to come, because I truly believe in this. If you have to say these crazy things, I would rather you say them to me than those girls that I am fighting with.”
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