UMass suspended its coach 1 game for saying a player was ‘raped’ on a non-penalty call

UMass suspended head football coach Mark Whipple without pay for one week after he said one his players was “raped” on a play that didn’t lead to a penalty call. His suspension covers all coaching activities and runs through the Minutemen’s Week 6 game against USF. The university also says Whipple will undergo mandatory sensitive training.

Here’s the transcript of Whipple’s Saturday remarks that included the “raped” quote, with bolding from me. This all came after the Minutemen lost to Ohio:

Question: Coach, at halftime you talked about this being a shootout; your thoughts on the second half?

Whipple: “Our guys played hard; they have a good team. I thought it was… MAC (conference) got their revenge on us, officiating-wise — the worst I’ve ever been a part of. I’ve been in the SEC, I’ve been in the NFL and I’ve never seen anything so bad: six holds against none until at the end. At least when I got a 15-yarder the guy finally threw a flag. I thought our guys fought hard at the end there. We couldn’t make enough plays.

“We had a chance there with 16 down and they rape us, and he picks up the flag. So our guys fought. They have a good team and they were home, and I thought our guys were certainly ready to play because we went up 14-nothing. We just have to get ready for next week. We didn’t make enough plays to beat a team like that.”

Whipple apologized in a statement distributed by the university.

“I am deeply sorry for the word I used on Saturday to describe a play in our game,” he said. “It is unacceptable to make use of the word ‘rape’ in the way I did and I am very sorry for doing so. It represents a lack of responsibility on my part as the leader of this program and a member of this university’s community, and I am disappointed with myself that I made this comparison when commenting after our game.”

Athletic director Ryan Bamford also apologized and said Whipple’s comment was “highly inappropriate, insensitive, and inexcusable under any circumstance.”

Whipple, 61, was a longtime NFL assistant before taking charge of UMass for the 2014 season. The Minutemen have a bye week after the USF game the head coach will miss, but he’ll be back in commission for the second half of the regular season.