Mountain West commissioner heartbroken over turmoil surrounding San Jose State volleyball

Mountain West Conference Commissioner Gloria Nevarez said Thursday the forfeitures that volleyball teams are willing to take to avoid playing San Jose State is “not what we celebrate in college athletics” and that she is heartbroken over what has transpired this season surrounding the Spartans and their opponents.

Four teams have canceled games against San Jose State: Boise State, Southern Utah, Utah State and Wyoming, with none of the schools explicitly saying why they were forfeiting.

A group of Nevada players issued a statement saying they will not take the floor when the Wolf Pack are scheduled to host the Spartans on Oct. 26. They cited their “right to safety and fair competition,” though their school reaffirmed Thursday that the match is still planned and that state law bars forfeiture “for reasons related to gender identity or expression.”

All those schools, except Southern Utah, are in the Mountain West. New Mexico, also in the MWC, went ahead with its home match on Thursday night, which was won by the Spartans, 3-1, the team's first victory since Sept. 24.

“It breaks my heart because they’re human beings, young people, student-athletes on both sides of this issue that are getting a lot of national negative attention," Nevarez said in an interview with The Associated Press at Mountain West basketball media days. “It just doesn’t feel right to me.”

Republican governors of Idaho, Nevada, Utah and Wyoming have made public statements in support of the cancellations, citing a need for fairness in women’s sports. Former President Donald Trump, the GOP nominee in this year's presidential race, this week referenced an unidentified volleyball match when he was asked during a Fox News town hall about transgender athletes in women's sports.

“I saw the slam, it was a slam. I never saw a ball hit so hard, hit the girl in the head,” Trump replied before he was asked what can be done. “You just ban it. The president bans it. You just don’t let it happen.”

After Trump's comment, San Diego State issued a statement that said “it has been incorrectly reported that an San Diego State University student-athlete was hit in the face with a volleyball during match play with San Jose State University. The ball bounced off the shoulder of the student-athlete, and the athlete was uninjured and did not miss a play.”

San Jose State has not made any direct comments about the politicians’ “fairness” references, and Nevarez did not go into details.

“I’m learning a lot about the issue,” Nevarez said. "I don’t know a lot of the language yet or the science or the understanding nationally of how this issue plays out. The external influences are so far on either side. We have an election year. It’s political, so, yeah, it feels like a no-win based on all the external pressure.”

The cancellations could mean some teams will not qualify for the conference tournament Nov. 27-30 in Las Vegas, where the top six schools are slated to compete for the league championship.

“The student-athlete (in question) meets the eligibility standard, so if a team does not play them, it’s a forfeit, meaning they take a loss,” Nevarez said.

That was not the case in New Mexico, where coach Jon Newman-Gonchar said his team discussed whether to play SJSU.

“We’re a volleyball team that wants to compete and get better," he said after Thursday night's loss in Albuquerque, New Mexico. "There really wasn’t much of a conversation so much about the personnel on the other side of the team. We just asked, are you comfortable playing, are there any concerns? Every single athlete said they were excited to play and get better.”

San Jose State coach Todd Kress said playing was his team's “safe haven” and noted that security and police escorts are now involved when his team takes the court. He has not discussed specific players publicly since the forfeits began.

“I know that it’s definitely taken a toll on many of them. They’re receiving messages of hate, which is completely ridiculous to me," he said in Albuquerque. "Some of those people are the underbelly of society that you attack an 18, 19, 20-year-old female. And even more so if you’re a parent and you’re attacking 18, 19 or 20-year-olds. Would you want your student-athlete, your daughter, to face the same kind of hate that you’re dishing out?”

The Spartans next play Saturday at Air Force, a week before the scheduled Oct. 26 match in Reno — if it goes on.

Nevada released a statement acknowledging that “a majority of the Wolf Pack women’s volleyball team” had decided to forfeit against San Jose State. The school said only the university can take that step but any player who decides not to play would face no punishment.

“When we had our first forfeit, there was a lot of heartbreak. And now, we’ve kind of, not come to expect it but we know the certain programs that may forfeit," Kress said. “It still does hurt our student-athletes when we don’t play a match, but I think they’ve come to accept it a little more and I think that’s a very unfortunate thing to say.”

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AP freelance writer Glen Rosales contributed from Albuquerque, New Mexico.