In response to the recent scandals concerning sexually explicit reports on the Women’s soccer team, Harvard has officially ended the Men’s soccer team’s season.
The Harvard Crimson reported that Athletics Director Robert L. Scalise sent a letter to student-athletes on Thursday that the University was terminating the Men’s season after finding that the reports scandal continued beyond 2012 and even into the 2016 season.
“As a direct result of what Harvard Athletics has learned, we have decided to cancel the remainder of the 2016 men’s soccer season,” Scalise wrote. “The team will forfeit its remaining games and will decline any opportunity to achieve an Ivy League championship or to participate in the NCAA Tournament this year.”
The Harvard Crimson first reported the news on October 25. A nine-page “scouting report” in which, in lewd terms, the author of the report individually evaluated each female recruit, assigned them numerical scores and wrote paragraph-long assessments of the women including pictures of each taken from social media sites.
University President Drew G. Faust asked the Office of General Counsel to review the case, and upon receiving news of its continuation beyond 2012, stated she “was deeply distressed to learn that the appalling actions of the 2012 men’s soccer team were not isolated to one year or the actions of a few individuals.”
“The decision to cancel a season is serious and consequential,” added Faust, “and reflects Harvard’s view that both the team’s behavior and the failure to be forthcoming when initially questioned are completely unacceptable, have no place at Harvard, and run counter to the mutual respect that is a core value of our community.”
The Office of Sexual Assault Prevention and Response has stated they will be working with all student-athletes, and especially the men’s soccer team, to further educate them on the issue.