Below an email I received two days ago. He sent it to me because I have blogged on the Duke Case and he knows me from my own local athletic involvement. I checked on the authenticity of the source, and I think the guy is legit. I have edited a few parts to assure the anonymity of the sender. It has been my opinion that the only reason the Duke leadership is now looking for cover on the "rape" case is that their basketball recruiting may be having difficulty. The author is a SoCal high school football coach. Stuff in parenthesis are mine. The slightly edited email:

I am a local coach and member of a board of directors for a local league. I have a lot of friends and acquaintances in the coaching world, and because of Coach K's (Mike Krzyzewski) big rep as a basketball coach and motivator he is always asked to contribute time when he or his assistants are in town. In a conversation with one of his assistant coaches who was in (the area) to talk to a local hot shot basketball player he told me that the "scandal" was killing his recruiting because all the other recruiters are trashing Duke to the (prospect's) parents by focusing on the faculty behavior in the (rape) matter. And (apparently) many of the parents are particularly concerned. I think that a fall off in basketball recruiting has as much to do with the sudden faculty turnaround as do ethics concerns. One top Duke kid has left the team reportedly angry and scared over the tumult (a guy named Boateng), and the (assistant) coach was concerned that another good local kid, Glasser, didn't want to talk to him at all and went to one of the Arizona schools. He gave a pep talk to a few local teams and went back to Durham.

I think the continuing negative ink surrounding the scumbag faculty is going to impact a lot more than basketball, but basketball to Duke is like what actors are to a movie, take it away and there ain't no reason to go to Duke at all. I think the current law suit is a forerunner of many more to come. Let's hope so.