Nevada volleyball players pressured by ‘legal issues’ to play SJSU trans player amid school feud
In October, players on the University of Nevada Reno women’s volleyball team were involved in discussions with their university and athletic department over whether to play match against San Jose State University.
San Jose State had a trans athlete at the time.
Nevada players privately approached university administrators to express their desire to forfeit the game and join the four other programs that declined to play SJSU. But Nevada did not honor that request and instead published a statement insisting that he will play the match. Nevada also insisted its players would be allowed to skip the competition without facing discipline.
The team eventually gave up the day before the scheduled match, due to a lack of players. However, the university said it had spoken to the players about potential “legal issues” that would arise if the game did not go ahead.
“University administrators met with the Nevada volleyball team and discussed scenarios of what could happen if they chose not to play. One of the scenarios discussed revolved around potential legal issues for violating the Nevada Constitution,” the statement provided exclusively by the university said. Fox News Digital.
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The state constitution was revised in 2022, when Democratic lawmakers voted to pass the Equal Rights Amendment, which added gender identity to its list of diversity classifications protected by state law.
“Laws and regulations prohibit the University of Nevada from removing for reasons related to gender identity or expression. As a public university, removal for reasons involving gender identity or expression could constitute discrimination per se and violate the Nevada Constitution,” Nevada’s statement said.
Nevada’s statement was in response to allegations made by Independent Council on Women’s Sports (ICONS) co-founder Marsha Smith.
Smith met and spoke with multiple players on the Nevada team during the dispute and is leading a legal advocacy group that has filed a lawsuit against San Jose State and the Mountain West Conference over the way they handled the situation involving the trans athlete.
“At UNR, school administrators warned the athletes that they could face legal action if they refused to compete against SJSU’s team, which included a male starter,” Smith told Fox News Digital.
The dispute between the players escalated into a national controversy that even attracted mainstream attention in the weeks leading up to the November election.
Nevada players, including captain Sia Liilii, have repeatedly spoken out publicly against the university for refusing to surrender the game. Presumptive nominee for Trump’s Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard and former Nevada US Senate candidate Sam Brown even visited the team for photo ops and interviews.
The scale of the controversy only increased as the October 26 match date approached. On October 22, Nevada and San Jose State announced that the game would be moved from Nevada’s campus in Reno to San Jose State’s campus in the Bay Area, California, claiming that the location change “is in the best interest of both programs and the good interest of being a student-athlete , coaches, sports staff and spectators.”
But then, the day before the game, Nevada announced that its team would surrender, citing the fact that there weren’t enough players willing to participate. Nevada suffered a losing streak in its record, for the game, and then finished the season just 1-7.
Nevada players previously talked about the pressure they faced from the university to play the ua game press conference at their university which was held on the day of the originally scheduled match on October 26.
Liilii broke down in tears from the moment she stepped on the podium as she recounted her experience telling school officials she didn’t want to compete against a transgender player.
“We felt unsafe and rejected,” Liilii said, sobbing. “We met with our school officials to give them the new statement from our team, but they didn’t want to hear it. We were told we weren’t educated enough and didn’t understand the science. We were told to reconsider our position.”
Nevada sophomore Masyn Navarro said her teammates were told to “shut up” about the controversy during a press conference.
“It shouldn’t be that hard to stand up for women. However, now we’re going to take this opportunity to stand up as a team, since some of us have been told to be silent,” Navarro said.
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Formerly Nevada Athletic Director Stephanie Rempe made a statement to Fox News Digital talking about the allegations made at the press conference.
“I did not say, and I am not aware of any member of the athletic administration team telling members of our women’s volleyball team that they ‘are not educated enough,’ that they ‘don’t understand the science,’ that they should reevaluate theirs, or that they should ‘shut up’ about with his participation in the October 26 game scheduled against San Jose State University.”
Rempe said she apologized to the players about how they were informed the university planned to continue playing, even after the players voted to surrender.
“On Oct. 14 and Oct. 22, I spoke with the team for less than five minutes each time and those meetings were operational in nature. In all three meetings I shared our sincere apologies for not sharing the statement released on Oct. 3. prior to their game against UNLV- and, as has been said on several occasions, we continue to support the rights of volleyball players who choose and choose not to participate,” said Rempe.
Article I, Section 24 of the Nevada Constitution states that “Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by this state or any of its political subdivisions because of race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, age , disability, descent or national origin.”
But Liilii is now one of 11 former or current Mountain West volleyball players involved in a lawsuit against San Jose State and the Mountain West over the way they handled a situation involving a trans athlete.
San Jose State co-captain Brooke Slusser is leading the charge and is included in a separate lawsuit against the NCAA alleging her experience of having to share a team, bedroom and trade spaces with a trans athlete while the player’s gender information was actively withheld from her for an entire season by the school and the conference.
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Other players on the list of plaintiffs are Alyssa Sugai, Elle Patterson, Nicanora Clarke, Kaylie Ray, Macey Boggs, Sierra Grizzle, Jordan Sandy, Katelyn Van Kirk and Kiersten Van Kirk. Former SJSU assistant volleyball coach Melissa Batie-Smoose, who was suspended by San Jose State after she filed a Title IX complaint alleging favorable treatment of a trans player, is also a plaintiff.
Smith told Fox News Digital that many players expressed fear of retaliation from their schools when deciding whether or not to join the lawsuit.
“The most common first question we hear from female NCAA athletes seeking support is, ‘What can my school or the NCAA do to retaliate against me if I speak out against allowing men in women’s sports?’ They’re often afraid of losing their scholarships or being kicked off their teams,” Smith told Fox News Digital.
“The first assurance we provide is that these athletes have a constitutional right to free speech. They can speak or submit to protest discrimination, violations of Title IX, or increased safety risks when competing against a male athlete—without fear of retaliation, regardless of the lies that their schools can tell them.”
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