The New York Post broke the news that coach Donald Copeland has been suspended and is currently under investigation by the school for mistreating his players. It was later confirmed by CBS, via the school’s athletic director, Walt Hameline.
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Among the alleged nightmarish conditions was the refusal to give his players water during strenuous workouts, with a current player writing a letter stating that he’d say, “If you’re thirsty, swallow your spit.”One player was tired of not being allowed to quench his thirst, so he hid a Gatorade bottle that the coach later found and punished the whole team for.“You’re all going to run until the Gatorade is out of his belly,” Copeland allegedly said.It left two players suffering from dehydration after the practice, with one in such bad shape that he went to the hospital.“In practice, he uses a bullying tactic in coaching style, saying cruel things about our upbringing or using harsh or foul/inappropriate language with the players that just tear us down mentally,” the player’s letter reportedly said.Those personal attacks, including telling players that their parents “gave birth to a p-ssy” and that they’d end up being “a loser in life.”Players disliked Copeland’s coaching so much that only two players from the previous season returned.One of those former players is R.J. Greene, who spoke to the Post on the record, alleging that Copeland acted as if they were at war every day. He remembers him calling him “a p-ssy, a b-tch, a punk [and] a vagina,” adding, “We could never just go to him and talk to him, not as a coach for a second. It was run like a military base.”The 41-year-old is set to start his fourth season as head coach in a few weeks, after leading Wagner to a 14-16 record last year.Copeland’s basketball roots began in Jersey City, where Bobby Hurley coached him before heading to Seton Hall for four years, during which he received Big East honors. Then, after playing overseas, he headed to Wagner in 2015 as he rose through the coaching ranks. Copeland had a brief stint at Seton Hall before returning to Staten Island to take on the head coaching role and has since led the team to the NCAA tournament.
See social media’s reaction to the allegations below.
