Coach of trans SJSU volleyball player blames teams that forfeited for ‘appalling, hateful messages’ to players
San Jose State volleyball head coach Todd Kress provided a statement to Fox News Digital Saturday after his team’s loss in the Mountain West Conference tournament final to Colorado State.
Kress addressed the national controversy surrounding a transgender player on his team and seven forfeited conference matches, including a tournament semifinal with Boise State.
“I will not sugarcoat our reality for the last two months. Our team prepared and was ready to play each match according to established Mountain West and NCAA rules of play. We did not take away anyone’s participation opportunities,” Kress wrote.
Boise State, Wyoming, Utah State and Nevada forfeited a total of seven matches against SJSU this season.
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Kress said each of those forfeits resulted in the team’s players, coaches and staffers receiving “appalling, hateful messages.”
“Sadly, others who for years have played this same team without incident chose not to play us this season. To be clear, we did not celebrate a single win by forfeiture. Instead, we braced for the fallout. Each forfeiture announcement unleashed appalling, hateful messages individuals chose to send directly to our student-athletes, our coaching staff and many associated with our program,” Kress wrote.
The coach, in just his second season with the team, admitted it was one of the toughest seasons of his life.
“This has been one of the most difficult seasons I’ve ever experienced, and I know this is true as well for many of our players and the staff who have been supporting us all along. Maintaining our focus on the court and ensuring the overall safety and well-being of my players amid the external noise have been my priorities,” Kress said.
Kress was named in a lawsuit filed by team co-captain Brooke Slusser and several other Mountain West players against the conference and San Jose State. The lawsuit alleges Kress has communicated with a private lawyer as part of his effort to get Slusser removed from the team and has told others he has filed Title IX complaints against Slusser based not on comments Slusser has made in practice, but on communications Slusser has made to the media and in public forums concerning her beliefs.
Slusser has also alleged the university has threatened to take away her scholarship for speaking on the issues of sharing a team, locker room and bedroom with transgender teammate Blaire Fleming.
Still, Kress thanked Slusser in his statement Saturday, along with Fleming and the other seniors on the team.
“Our team played their hearts out today, the way they have done all season. I want to recognize and thank our seniors — Alessia [Buffagni], Chandler [Manusky], Brooke [Bryant], Brooke and Blaire — for their tremendous efforts on the court all season long. They have all helped us to get where we are,” Kress wrote.
Kress also thanked San Jose State University Police Chief Michael Carroll for his work protecting the team from potential threats this season.
A San Jose State spokesperson previously confirmed to Fox News Digital that the program did not formally notify any of the opponents on its schedule of the situation involving Fleming and Slusser ahead of matches this season after Slusser joined her first lawsuit against the NCAA in September over her trans teammate’s presence.
However, that spokesperson also confirmed the university did coordinate police protection for the players with the schools that hosted the team’s away matches after security measures had to be elevated due to the attention the team was getting.
When Southern Utah became the first program to announce it would be forfeiting a match against the Spartans in early September, that was the first indicator of heightened security. That’s when the college brought in armed security.
A San Jose State University spokesperson confirmed to Fox News Digital the volleyball team was told it would be getting added security of some kind after the first forfeit by an opposing program as news of Slusser’s lawsuit spread.
Shortly after the first forfeit, the university’s in-house police department was alerted to the situation and got involved. Police protection was assigned for every game thereafter, and police departments at other campuses were assigned to protect the team when it traveled.
Police presence was noticeably strong for the Spartans’ first meeting against eventual conference champion Colorado State Oct. 3. Multiple officers were photographed on the court that night, looking alert in the stands, entrances and at the players.
Slusser previously told Fox News Digital she had received a warning from a teammate Oct. 2, the night before a match, to “stay away” during the match because something “bad” was going to happen to her.
San Jose State University responded to questions about whether federal investigators had been involved.
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“The university has asked students and staff to share all concerning communications with UPD to be evaluated and addressed appropriately, including in conjunction with proper authorities where appropriate,” San Jose State said in a previous statement.
And Kress was tasked with coaching his team through all of it. Kress is not the coach who recruited Fleming to SJSU. That was former head coach Trent Kersten, who left the program after Fleming’s first season in San Jose State in 2022.
A lawsuit that includes former Spartans assistant coach Melissa Batie-Smoose alleges Kersten recruited Fleming knowing the player was transgender but didn’t tell other players.
Kress took over the program in 2023 and expressed frustration with Kersten’s decision in an interview with OutKick.
“My frustration with Trent is an unfortunate situation,” Kress said. “[Kersten] obviously knows Blaire is in the crosshairs of this debate, and yet he has not reached out to [Fleming] one time to check in on [Fleming’s] mental health. I find it sad, to be honest.”
Before that, Kress suggested tension in the locker room because of Fleming’s presence on the team and Slusser’s lawsuits “might not be a bad thing.”
“Sometimes tension is not necessarily a bad thing, and I’m not saying that there is. But, you know, when you do have tension or you do have confrontations, I mean, I’m a person that believes that, from confrontation, good things usually happen. We settle our differences, and we work through it,” Kress told reporters Oct. 3 after the first Colorado State match.
“The last thing that I would want is there’s the white elephant in the room, and there is no tension, we don’t address it, and we never move past it, right? So I think there may be tension, but it dies. If we’re in a meeting room and there’s tension, it dies there. If there’s tension on the court, it dies there. We really don’t let the boundaries cross over, and that’s how I think we’ve been so successful thus far.”
Now the Spartans’ tournament run is over. The players made it through unharmed. But the lawsuits continue.
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