Harvard Cancels Men’s Soccer Team Season Following Reports Of Teammates Rating Female Players’ Bodies

Harvard University has canceled the remainder of their men’s soccer season after an investigation discovered the team repeatedly rated the players on the women’s soccer team based on their physical appearance.

Harvard Cancels Men’s Soccer Team Season

The Harvard men’s soccer team’s practice of making lewd comments about their female counterparts allegedly dates back to at least 2012, according to a document uncovered by The Harvard Crimson last month.

“As a direct result of what Harvard Athletics has learned, we have decided to cancel the remainder of the 2016 men’s soccer season,” athletic director Robert L. Scalise wrote in an email to Harvard student-athletes. “The team will forfeit its remaining games and will decline any opportunity to achieve an Ivy League championship or to participate in the NCAA Tournament this year.”

The male students reportedly kept detailed notes on the incoming players for the women’s team, going so far as to include paragraphs about their appearances, numerical rating scores, photos and hypothetical sexual “positions” for each. The women mentioned in the 2012 report, which the male players called their ‘scouting report’ and began circulating online, responded with an essay in the Crimson. “In all, we do not pity ourselves, nor do we ache most because of the personal nature of this attack,” the essay reads. “More than anything, we are frustrated that this is a reality that all women have faced in the past and will continue to face throughout their lives.”

Harvard’s soccer team was No. 1 in the Ivy League standings, so the missed opportunity for them to play in the season’s final two games will surely sting both the players and several student fans on campus. A win against Columbia on Saturday would have clinched an automatic NCAA bid for Harvard.

University president Drew Faust said in a statement that she “was deeply distressed to learn that the appalling actions of the 2012 men’s soccer team were not isolated to one year or the actions of a few individuals.”

“The decision to cancel a season is serious and consequential, and reflects Harvard’s view that both the team’s behavior and the failure to be forthcoming when initially questioned are completely unacceptable, have no place at Harvard, and run counter to the mutual respect that is a core value of our community,” Faust wrote.

Faust added the review is separate from any action by the University’s Title IX office, which investigates complains of sexual assault and harassment.

Rakesh Khurana, the dean of Harvard, released a statement Thursday evening saying he was “saddened and disappointed to learn that the extremely offensive ‘scouting report’ produced by the 2012 men’s soccer team continued through the current season.”

Scalise added that going forward, Harvard Athletics will partner with the Office of Sexual Assault Prevention and Response and other Harvard College resources in order to educate all student-athletes on “the seriousness of these behaviors and the general standard of respect and conduct that is expected,” he said.

CAMBRIDGE, MA – FEBRUARY 11: Historian Drew Gilpin Faust speaks at Harvard University in the Thompson Room of the Barker Center as she is named President of Harvard February 11, 2007 in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Harvard appointed Faust as the first woman to lead the oldest college in the U.S. as campuses nationwide struggle with a shortage of female faculty members. (Photo by Jodi Hilton/Getty Images)