Report: Former Yale Soccer Coach Named In College Bribery Scandal Pressured Players Into Writing His Papers For Grad School

Former Yale women’s soccer coach Rudy Meredith abused his position with the team to help privileged kids pretend that they were athletic recruits so as to make their admissions process into one of the more prestigious universities in the country that much easier. But it appears that his shadiness did not stop there.

In a report from Bill Gallagher and Skakel McCooey of the Yale Daily News, the coach allegedly used players from his team to help him out with papers he needed to turn in for his graduate courses at Ohio University. The players were not only asked to edit what he wrote, they were often asked to write significant portions of the assignments for him, according to two anonymous former players. They added that players often felt compelled to do what they were told because they believed it would result in better treatment within the team. Meredith got his degree in recreation and sports science and coaching education in 2018.

As far as disciplinary responses from the athletics department went, things left a lot to be desired:

According to one of the former players, team members brought their concerns to the Department of Athletics as well as University President Peter Salovey. Salovey allegedly received an anonymous letter from a member of the team describing what Meredith asked his players to do. Yale’s Human Resources Department then conducted interviews with Meredith and a few members on the team, according to the same player. Both sources told the News that after conducting the investigation, the athletics administration, headed at the time by former director of Athletics Tom Beckett, took no action against Meredith despite numerous complaints from team members that one of the sources said spanned many years.

Most of the members of the administration relevant to this story did not provide the report with any comment besides a university spokesperson who gave a canned statement about how investigations aren’t always apparent to everyone.

Even before these scandals broke, it appears as though Meredith wasn’t exactly seen in the most favorable light. One of the anonymous sources said he was a coach that didn’t motivate anyone and that “many players felt like they got worse over the four years playing at Yale.” If that’s the general consensus, it’s got to be tough as a player knowing that you spent your college eligibility with a coach who was as lousy at committing crimes as he was at coaching sports.

[ Yale Daily News]

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