Ohio State head football coach Jim Tressel’s resignation earlier this week “came on the heels of an especially tough report last week from a rather unlikely source: The Lantern, Ohio State's student-run daily,” according to Karp & Everson of the WALL STREET JOURNAL. The Lantern in the story “quoted a former Buckeye player, Ray Small, who confirmed some of the allegations the school was investigating.” Reaction to the Lantern's story “has been fierce.” Small, the player the paper interviewed, later “told ESPN his comments were mischaracterized.” The Lantern subsequently “posted the audio of the interview and said it stood by its story.” Other OSU players also “have expressed their displeasure.” Karp & Everson noted this sort of reporting “takes more nerve than you might think.” Student reporters “who paint a school's sports teams in a negative light have faced ridicule and social isolation,” with some “fired from their posts.” Former Notre Dame student Ellie Hall said that she “was fired from Notre Dame's independently funded student newspaper, the Observer, after writing a piece for the Huffington Post which quoted from a panicked message posted on Twitter by Declan Sullivan, the Notre Dame student who fell to his death in a windstorm last fall while videotaping football practice from a tower high above the field.” Observer Editor-in-chief Douglas Farmer said that Hall “was a ‘very good contributor,’ and was simply asked to ‘take a break’ because she had violated the paper's policy by contributing to another publication without clearance.” Karp & Everson wrote even “with a paper's support, muckraking in college can be an uncomfortable proposition.” The Univ. of Montana’s school paper, the Kaimin, in the fall of ’09 “ran a story about an alleged assault by two football players on another student." Then-UM football coach Bobby Hauck “refused to answer any and all questions from reporters from the paper for weeks” (WALL STREET JOURNAL, 6/2).
EYE ON THE BUCKEYES: In Columbus, Matt Burns reported Ohio State “filed suit this week in U.S. District Court in Columbus against Tuscaloosa, Ala.-based Touchdown Alabama Magazine LLC and owners Bennie Bice III and Michael J. Lacy.” The company runs a website at touchdownbuckeyes.net and is “preparing an August release of Touchdown Buckeyes, a glossy magazine it says ‘strives to be the most up-to-date, relevant and exiting magazine covering Buckeyes football.’” But their effort “isn’t licensed by the university, leading the school to sue on three counts: Trademark infringement, ‘cybersquatting’ and unfair competition.” Ohio State is “asking the court to force the company to turn over the website and copies of the publication, cough up any profit, stop using trademarked images and logos, and pay attorney fees.” The lawsuit states that Touchdown Buckeyes is “billing itself as ‘Ohio State’s premiere college football magazine’ with plans for seven issues throughout the season and a special publication dedicated to the annual University of Michigan game” (BIZJOURNALS.com, 6/2).
