A Florida State University football player says that he and his teammates are boycotting workouts after comments made by their head coach.
Defensive lineman Marvin Wilson made the statement Wednesday, tweeting out a response to an interview that first-year coach Mike Norvell gave earlier in the week. Norvell had told The Athletic that he spent last weekend having personal conversations with every Florida State player about the death of George Floyd and the resulting protests across the world.
“We’ve had a lot of open communication with our team, our players and our coaches,” Norvell told The Athletic. “I went back and forth individually with every player this weekend. And that was something that was important to me because this is a heartbreaking time in our country. You see hate and you see discrimination. You see some of the acts that have occurred; I mean, it is a problem. And that’s something that we have to stand together and we have to work to get it fixed.
“We’re trying to meet our guys at their need and be able to share some of the emotions that we’re all going through.”
Wilson, a senior, said that those conversations never happened, tweeting “Man this s*** did not happen mane. We got a generated text that was sent to everybody. There was no one on one talk between us and coach. This is a lie and me and me teammates as a whole are outraged and we will not be working out until further notice.”
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Several of Wilson’s teammates shared his tweet, while ESPN reported that the Seminoles were scheduled to have a team meeting Thursday morning. Florida State players had returned to campus Monday for voluntary workouts.
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