The Duke Lacrosse Case As Rorschach Test.

Report is the North Carolina attorney general will be announcing sometime later this morning that all charges will be dropped against former Duke lacrosse players Reade Seligmann, David Evans, and Colin Finnerty with regard to a rape accusation at an off-campus house last year.

This seemed to be in sight when Durham County DA Mike Nifong recused himself from the case after the accuser changed her story. Nifong is now facing ethics violations in front of the North Carolina bar, and he could be disbarred as punishment (and some suggested the accused should go after him.)

It's worth noting for all the ways this case was initially examined -- the accuser was black, an exotic dancer, and a student at a nearby public university; the accused were three relatively well-off white men attending a private university at a game widely perceived as the purview of well-off white men. It pushed every button possible for media attention and pre-judgment on everyone involved, including the media, and a lot of outlets wound up eating crow.

Ultimately, your initial reaction regarding guilt or innocence when the accusations were handed down probably told a lot more about you than it did about the case itself, much like a lot of crimes that are he-said-she-said by nature, and still awaiting concrete DNA evidence at the beginning of the frenzy (which there was none that directly implicated the accused; Nifong thought he had enough circumstantial evidence to go on.)

Much like the rape allegations and civil settlement involving Kobe Bryant and a Vail hotel worker (which pushed all the same racial and social buttons, but in different combinations), the case became less about sport, and like everything in America when reduced to a national news package than runs no longer than one minute and 30 seconds, more about the divide, the distrust, the fear, and where you stood on that -- and let's not forget academia vs. athletic tensions prevalent on many Division I campuses. But then again, it may have been just like sport, because a lot of people probably picked sides, based on our own biases and experiences -- we are only human; we have a tendency to do this.

Somewhere it became less about the accuser and the accused and more about us. No matter where the truth really lay at that house party, that wasn't fair to anyone involved.

(Although Wikipedia is hit and miss, it has a good series of articles at the bottom for citations worth looking at on this topic.)

Bark Like the Dog You Are, McRoberts!

I bring this video montage from the Big Lead, because no picture really encapsulates the suck that Josh McRoberts encapsulated for Duke this year after playing well his freshman year, and now, he wants to go to the NBA and mix it up with the big guns?



"Young bones groan, and the rocks below say, 'Throw your skinny body down, son.'" - the Smiths

This Never Gets Old. Ever.

Thank you, Virginia Commonwealth University. You may pop those unis with pride.

the gunslingers meet in Austin.

How sick was A&M - Texas? I mean, you can look at the stat lines for both Texas' Kevin Durant (30 pts and 16 boards) and the Aggies' Acie Law IV (33 points and a couple of absolutely nasty 3-pointers when they mattered -- I'm convinced the "IV" on his uniform is the source of his power), but you could have guessed if you just saw the game go to double OT. Texas' Damion James and D.J. Augustin were playing lights out too (OMDQ has more on the bizarre that is Damion James. I saw some of what he writes. I suspect we may have another in the mold of Agent Zero for bizarre, yet endearing acts.)

Now Texas is giving me fits for this week's Aggro-Crag at JCMJ -- I'm not sure whether to go Texas or Kansas this weekend. And despite the loss, I am still gonna ride the Aggie Bandwagon unless something so shocking happens in the Big 12 Tourney that I'd sprain an ankle getting off. This could be the best of the conference tournaments with three teams with super-legitimate shots at nabbing the title and being teams NO ONE wants anything to do with come St. Patrick's Day weekend.

Another hoops note: I did not catch Maryland-Duke, but given that the Terps went into Cameron and owned the Blue Devils AGAIN (making them 3-0 vs. the usual power boys of Duke and UNC this year), I'm fearing the turtle right now.