Having a male-born player on the team wasn’t enough for San Jose State, which lost in the Mountain West women’s volleyball championship Saturday to top-seeded Colorado State at the end-of-season tournament in Las Vegas.
The Colorado State Rams defeated the second-seeded Spartans by three sets to one, earning an automatic invitation to the NCAA Division I women’s volleyball tournament, which runs Dec. 5-22.
In doing so, the Rams did the NCAA a solid. The Colorado State victory means the NCAA’s annual volleyball showcase will likely avoid the uproar over San Jose State star player Blaire Fleming, a biological male who identifies as female, that engulfed the Mountain West Conference’s 2024 season.
Following the match, San Jose State Coach Todd Kress released a statement commending his players and blasting the “external noise” surrounding the season, including the “appalling, hateful messages” received by coaches and players.
“I will not sugarcoat our reality for the last two months. Our team was prepared and ready to play each match according to established Mountain West and NCAA rules of play. We did not take away anyone’s participation opportunities,” he said in a statement.
The team won six games by forfeit as teams from Idaho, Nevada, Utah and Wyoming refused to play the Spartans, but Mr. Kress said “we did not celebrate a single win by forfeiture. Instead, we braced for the fallout.”
Boise State ended its season by forfeiting Friday’s semifinal match rather than play against San Jose, a decision cheered by elected officials including Idaho Gov. Brad Little and Sen. Jim Risch, Idaho Republican.
The conference’s 2022 Transgender Participation Policy allows male-born players to compete in women’s sports based on gender identity as long as they keep their testosterone in serum under 10 nmol/liter for at least a year before competition.
It’s over. Colorado State defeats San Jose State to win the Mountain West and earn a berth in the NCAA Tournament.
— Dan Zaksheske (@RealDanZak) December 1, 2024
The NCAA is breathing a huge sigh of relief as transgender Blaire Fleming’s college career comes to an end without an NCAA Tournament berth. pic.twitter.com/qHpXKG3vFz
Eleven current and former players sued two weeks ago to block Fleming from playing in the championship, accusing the conference of violating Title IX with its transgender policy, but a federal judge ruled against them.
One of the players who sued to declare Fleming ineligible was a teammate, Spartans co-captain Brooke Slusser.
Fleming, a fifth-year redshirt senior, has not commented publicly on the pushback. The university has stood behind the transgender player.
The championship game Saturday also saw three Colorado State players—Mayala Jones, Kennedy Stanford and Naeemah Weathers—take a knee during the national anthem. Rams coach Emily Kohan said that they have done so for years.
Fleming’s collegiate volleyball career began at Coastal Carolina, but the athlete transferred to San Jose State in 2021, shortly before South Carolina passed a law barring male-born athletes from competing in girls’ and women’s scholastic sports based on gender identity.
California has no such law. Fleming won a full scholarship to play at San Jose State, but the coaching staff didn’t inform the players that the recruit was a biological male, according to the players’ lawsuit.
The players cited concerns about locker-room privacy and athletic fairness. Slusser said she was assigned to room with Fleming on road trips last season without knowing that the athlete was a biological male.
The players also worried about the concussion risk from Fleming’s hits due to the athlete’s superior power. Two of them said they lost scholarships after being beaten out by Fleming for a spot on the team, the lawsuit said.
• Valerie Richardson can be reached at vrichardson@washingtontimes.com.
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