Couch: The story of volleyball guru Rick Butler is shameful, but it's not an MSU story

Michigan State University deserves plenty of criticism and shame for its handling of Larry Nassar, its response to his victims and its systemic failures in acting to prevent and treat sexual abuse on its campus.

MSU does not deserve the shame of Rick Butler. Not on its own. Not in a headline. Not based on what we know. And not based on what those who are behind the story say. 

Butler, it appears, was a cunning predator early in his career. He is a powerhouse youth volleyball coach in Chicago’s suburbs, accused of sexually assaulting several of his pupils decades ago. He’s recently been banned by the Amateur Athletic Union, USA volleyball, etc., and faces a class-action lawsuit for deceiving players and parents into joining his revered Sports Performance volleyball club. He denies wrongdoing and has never been charged with a crime, though the statue of limitations had expired when his accusers first came forward in 1995.

His story has escalated in the last couple of years through the reporting of ESPN and, most recently, the Chicago Sun-Times, followed by the lawsuit and, Tuesday, an Associated Press story, titled, “Michigan State kept ties to coach accused of sexual abuse.”

RELATED:  MSU kept ties to coach accused of sexual abuse

Butler might be a monster. He is not MSU’s monster, however.

His ties to MSU volleyball coach Cathy George appear no stronger than his ties to several coaches elsewhere. That doesn’t absolve George from not speaking up if she knew anything, or from seeking the truth or setting an example. The shame in the Rick Butler story, beyond Butler, rests with many in the volleyball community.

MSU is singled out prominently — though not named — in the lawsuit against Butler filed in late February for having a “special relationship” with him, including George serving as one of Butler’s coaches at Sports Performance in the mid-1980s.

Then, a paragraph later, a serious accusation: “Not only does Michigan State work with Butler and Sports Performance in identifying potential recruits, at least one Michigan State women’s volleyball coach has, as a proxy of Butler and Sports Performance, taken an active role in denying the accusations against Butler and discouraging victims from speaking out.” 

George didn’t respond to a text message seeking an interview. An MSU spokesperson said Wednesday that interim President John Engler’s statement Tuesday would stand for George and the university. That statement, while striking a sympathetic tone, did not address the claims in the lawsuit.

MSU wasn’t mentioned by accident. This is the influence of the Nassar case, the product of a crumbling reputation, of being associated first and foremost with sexual abuse.

When asked whether MSU would have been singled out in the Butler lawsuit if it wasn’t for Nassar, the lawyer representing the plaintiff said, “I can’t tell you. We obviously were aware of what was going on.”

“We were definitely thinking in terms of a broad view,” continued attorney Jay Edelson. “Institutions, like MSU and other institutions and governing bodies in volleyball, had a place in protecting young girls and didn’t live up to that.”

That might turn out to be indisputable. But if you read Tuesday’s AP story, you’d get the impression MSU was the chief enabler. Sarah Powers-Barnhard, among the first of Butler’s victims to come forward, told the AP that MSU “turned a blind eye” to Butler’s history. 

Powers-Barnhard will also tell you, if you ask, that the coaches at Nebraska and Minnesota were at least as connected to Butler as MSU's George was. If you look at the number of recruits MSU has landed in the past decade from Butler’s program (3), you’ll see it’s less than other programs. That’s important context.

So, too, is to understand the not-so-long ago response from the American Volleyball Coaches Association.

“One of the most shocking things was talking with the coaches association for volleyball and having them tell me, ‘The parents send their kids there, so who are we to say anything bad about Rick Butler, when it’s not an issue for the parents,’” said Nancy Hogshead-Makar, an Olympic swimmer-turned-civil rights attorney, who runs an organization advocating for female athletes called Champion Women.

“Then we of course find the parents and the parents say, ‘Well, we heard rumors but we couldn’t imagine they would be true if he was still coaching.’”

The executive director of the coaches association, Kathy DeBoer, did not return a message left Wednesday.

What’s happening at MSU right now is too serious to pile on without nuance and understanding. And to put the focus on MSU lets others off the hook and minimizes the problem.

That said, it’s easy to see why Butler’s victims and those trying to give them a voice are frustrated with George and MSU.

Powers-Barnhard has known George since they were teenagers in the Chicago area. And there is no question that Powers-Barnhard feels hurt by George’s words and actions.

When George reached out to Powers-Barnhard in 1995, when news first broke about Butler, Powers-Barnhard says George ended the conversation by saying, “I’m sorry that happened to you, but I’m still going to have to recruit from him.”

George was the coach at Western Michigan University then, where Powers-Barnhard had been a legendary player a decade earlier.

One can understand how Powers-Barnhard would have been heartbroken by such a callous comment. And, in 1995, one can perhaps see how a young coach might choose not to rock the boat on this subject.

RELATED:  Chicago Sun-Times four-part investigative series on Rick Butler

Last June, at a national tournament in Florida, as the Butler saga was reemerging and opposition strengthening, George sat next to Butler, even with a news camera crew present and others nearby wearing teal shirts that read, “I stand with them. Ask me why.”

“I have no idea why she sat there,” Powers-Barnhard said. “She could have been completely oblivious, because she knows him and they’re friendly and sat there. It’s unfortunate.”

A month later, MSU was among 130 entities — clubs, sponsors, governing bodies, about 10 universities — to receive a letter with evidence of Butler’s misdeeds.

“It was all original-source material,” said Hogshead-Makar said. “They didn’t have to take our word for it that this was a flat-out pedophile. They could make their own conclusions.”

MSU never responded to the initial letter, sent in July, which prompted a second letter in January. It didn't respond then, either. That led Hogshead-Makar, Powers-Barnhard and others to believe MSU didn’t care. But an MSU spokesperson said Wednesday that George was made aware of the letter.

And in February, when I ran into George in a hotel lobby just outside Chicago before an MSU basketball game against Northwestern, George said she wasn’t going to attend a Sports Performance showcase a few miles away with many of the country’s top prospects because she didn’t want to be seen at a Butler event. She instead was in town for the basketball game. Her son, Conner, was a sophomore on the MSU basketball team.

Powers-Barnhard and Hogshead-Makar were both unaware of this and happy to hear it.

“That’s new news,” Hogshead-Makar said. “I’m glad to hear that we’re being effective.”

The problem is, the AP story Tuesday led you to believe it was a continuous relationship between George and Butler. 

George might have been slow to come around. She definitely hurt an old friend. She should speak up, too. This is her reputation, her program. 

MSU, through George, perhaps has some culpability here, as do dozens of other coaches who ignored rumors and sought Butler’s friendship and the talent he cultivated.

“He’s very charming,” Powers-Barnhard said. “He’s very manipulative. So everyone around him is groomed and manipulated and charmed. It’s hard to overcome. The reason we were abused is he groomed everyone one around me. My own father. Every other player, coach, parent. You don’t have anybody to go to. They all believe him.”

That sounds a bit like a monster MSU has dealt with on its own campus, a story from which it can’t escape, shining a light on a culture that’s cracked. Butler’s evil is part of a cultural problem. But not exclusively MSU’s culture.

MORE GRAHAM COUCH:

• MSU community won't find trust again until Engler, board of trustees are gone
• For Lansing area, the Larry Nassar scandal is personal

Contact Graham Couch at gcouch@lsj.com. Follow him on Twitter @Graham_Couch.