In the latest chapter of the ongoing controversy following reports that a player on the San Jose State University women’s volleyball team is transgender, a lawsuit has been filed against the Mountain West Conference, the collegiate athletic conference of which SJSU is a part; the California State University system; and three SJSU staffers, including the head coach of the women’s volleyball team.
The plaintiffs — including SJSU volleyball co-captain Brooke Slusser and 10 other current and former student athletes in the Mountain West Conference — claim their Title IX rights are being violated by allowing a transgender athlete to play for a women’s sports team.
The 132-page suit seeks a court-ordered injunction to prevent the team’s alleged transgender player from participating in an upcoming conference tournament.
“It’s amazing that one person on our team is causing all of these issues,” Slusser told Fox News earlier this week.
Marshi Smith, a former NCAA champion swimmer and co-founder of the Independent Council on Women’s Sports, said it’s “important for these athletes to be given their fair chance.” The council is financially backing the suit.
“It’s disappointing it’s come to this point,” she said, calling it a “failure at every level of leadership.”
The Mountain West Conference said it is taking the suit’s allegations seriously.
“The Mountain West Conference prioritizes the best interests of our student-athletes and takes great care to adhere to NCAA and MW policies,” the conference said in a statement to NBC Bay Area. “While we are unable to comment on the pending litigation of this particular situation, we take seriously all concerns of student-athlete welfare and fairness.”
San Jose State University said it is in the process of reviewing the suit.
“We received the complaint and will review and respond appropriately. We have no further comment at this time,” SJSU told NBC Bay Area.
The suit also comes after it was reported that SJSU’s women’s volleyball associate head coach Melissa Batie-Smoose was “not with the team at this time” for undisclosed reasons.
Batie-Smoose, who is among the lawsuit’s 12 plaintiffs, started coaching the Spartans last year. She came to the university with more than 20 years of coaching experience, according to SJSU’s website. Prior to her tenure with the Spartans she coached at Fairfield University and got her start in Division 1 coaching at College of the Holy Cross and Cornell University.
SJSU confirmed Batie-Smoose’s absence earlier this month to NBC Bay Area but did not provide specifics.
Batie-Smoose addressed her departure from SJSU on social media Thursday.
“I was removed from my SJSU volleyball team for standing up for my players’ rights, but I’ve gained a new team of courageous women fighting the mistreatment facing all players in the Mountain West Conference,” Batie-Smoose said on X.
In addition to seeking that the alleged transgender player be barred from participating in the upcoming Mountain West Conference volleyball tournament, the plaintiffs are requesting that losses given to the teams that forfeited games due to the alleged transgender player be removed from team records, according to Smith from the Independent Council on Women’s Sports.
Already, four teams in the Mountain West Conference — University of Nevada, Reno; University of Wyoming; Boise State University; and Utah State University — have forfeited games against the SJSU Spartans. Separately, Southern Utah University, which is not in the Mountain West Conference, forfeited a match.
The protest against the Spartans’ program was further fueled after a federal lawsuit was filed against the NCAA. The lawsuit specifically calls out an NCAA policy that allows transgender athletes to compete on women’s teams under certain conditions. A member of the Spartans volleyball team joined the suit last month, claiming that having a transgender teammate is unsafe for her, her teammates, and opposing teams.
Due to the controversy, SJSU has provided extra security for the team at home and away matches.
Prior to the forfeiture by the University of Nevada, Reno, Mountain West Conference Commissioner Gloria Nevarez, one of the named defendant’s in Wednesday’s lawsuit, spoke out against the Spartans’ opponents’ decisions.
Nevarez said teams willing to avoid playing SJSU are “not what we celebrate in college athletics” and added that she is heartbroken over this season’s events.
“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. “It just doesn’t feel right to me.”
Governors from Nevada, Idaho, Utah and Wyoming have all publicly supported the canceled games, citing that there needs to be fairness in women’s sports.
SJSU has not commented on the politicians’ “fairness” statements.
