Three unidentified New Mexico State basketball players are accused of violently hazing teammate

The New Mexico State men’s basketball team abruptly canceled the remainder of its season Sunday after a police report was released accusing players of assaulting a teammate. The police report includes allegations of illegal detention, harassment and criminal sexual contact.

“It is time for this program to restart,” Chancellor Dan Arvizu said in the statement announcing the end of the season.

Arvizu said the closure was in response to a report filed with campus police Friday by a player against three teammates. First-year head coach Greg Heiar and his entire coaching staff were placed on paid administrative leave.

According to the report, the unnamed victim said that on February 6, his companions grabbed him, “they took off his clothes, exposing his buttocks, and began to beat him.” [buttocks]. He also went on to claim that they also touched his scrotum.

The victim, whose name was redacted in the report along with those of the other players, said other incidents involving inappropriate physical and sexual contact had been occurring in locker rooms and on road trips since last summer. Regarding the latter case, the victim told police that she had no choice but to let this happen “because it’s a 3 vs. 1 situation.”

Arvizu, who will leave the university in June after the Regents recently decided not to renew his contract, said “this action is clearly necessary, especially after receiving additional information and reviewing investigative reports related to the hazing allegations involving student-athletes on the team. ‘

“We must defend the safety of our students and the integrity of our university,” said Arvizu, who had initially suspended the program on Friday and then revealed what he called allegations of hazing a day later.

He said he had spoken with the commissioner of the Western Athletic Conference, who said he was reviewing how to treat the six New Mexico State games that will be scratched from the schedule regarding qualification for next month’s conference tournament.

The report says the victim went to campus police to report a possible assault, but did not want to press criminal charges at this time.

Hazing is a despicable act. It humiliates and degrades someone and has the potential to cause physical and emotional harm, or even death,” Arvizu said. “Unfortunately, hazing can become part of an organization’s culture, if left unchecked.”

The allegations come less than three months after the suspension of forward Mike Peake, who is under investigation in the fatal shooting of a student at the rival University of New Mexico school in Albuquerque on November 19.

Peake has not been charged in that case, which included state police stopping the team’s bus on Interstate 25 on its way back to Las Cruces shortly after the shooting. Missing from the bus were Peake and three of his teammates, who had taken him to the hospital with an injured leg.

New Mexico State finished the season going 9-15, with just two conference wins in 12 games. The Aggies, long a source of pride on their 13,000-student Las Cruces campus, have been to eight NCAA tournaments since 2007. They are scheduled to move from the WAC to Conference USA next season.

The next big decision for this program appears to be Tuesday, when university regents will hold a closed-door meeting to discuss “limited personnel matters related to individual employees.” He did not name the employees who were to be discussed. The meeting schedule came Saturday, a day after Arvizu placed coach Greg Heiar and his staff on administrative leave while suspending the season.

The cleanup for the 2022-23 campaign came a day after two players resigned following initial reports of the hazing incident.

One of them, redshirt freshman Shahar Lazar, said he was leaving because “I don’t think the program I originally committed to aligns with my core beliefs and values.”