Maryland’s Board of Regents to hold special closed meeting

The University System of Maryland’s Board of Regents will hold a special closed meeting Friday, as reported by Brett McMurphy on Wednesday night.

The session will take place one week after ESPN’s reports on the Maryland staff’s handling of Jordan McNair and the “toxic culture” within the football program. McNair collapsed during a team workout May 29 and died June 13.

A copy of the memo calling for the meeting lists these as the topics:

1. Discussion of personnel matters concerning specific individuals at UMCP.

2. Discussion with staff and legal counsel regarding a potential lawsuit against a USM institution.

There’s a lot still to be unearthed from this. McNair’s family is “likely” to file a lawsuit against Maryland, family attorney Billy Murphy has said. The school has accepted “legal and moral responsibility” for McNair’s death. This is presumably the lawsuit referred to in the memo, but it’s also possible there’s another potential suit that hasn’t drawn as much attention. The “specific individuals” could be any combination of Loh, Evans, Durkin or others on the football staff. Only one employee—strength and conditioning coach Rick Court—is gone so far; it’s hard not to see more departures coming.

We’ll have updates as more information becomes available.

In other football news

Maryland’s acting head coach, Matt Canada, addressed the media for the first time in his new role yesterday.

Former Michigan star and current Cleveland Browns safety Jabrill Peppers was rather critical of Durkin’s coaching tactics in an interview on The Rich Eisen Show.

On Monday, The Washington Post wrote about Durkin still having support among parents in the program. That story included this anonymous quote:

“A few major donors have called me,” one longtime booster said. “They’ve all expressed that basically DJ is getting made to hang out to dry and that some of these so-called athletes are looking for participation trophies. Life is not about participation. It’s about learning life skills. DJ has been a great teacher of those.”

Here’s Spencer Hall on why that’s a bad quote.

The Ringer has weighed in, with Michael Baumann arguing that this is part of a larger issue with college football.

We tried to make sense of this whole situation on our podcast.

In better news

Maryland basketball has a new member of its 2018-19 team. Meet three-star forward Ricky Lindo.

Former Maryland second baseman Brandon Lowe picked up his first two MLB hits last night in Yankee Stadium. He also recorded two RBIs in the Rays’ 6-1 win over the Yankees.

And the Maryland fall sports season starts tonight! The women’s soccer team plays at William & Mary at 4:40 p.m. ET in Harrisonburg, Virginia, as part of the James Madison Invitational. Here’s Henry with your Maryland season preview.