Student media is a tricky business.We hold ourselves to the same standard of journalistic integrity as any professional media organization, but our time at the University is still very much a learning experience — and we do make mistakes.Unfortunately, we came up short twice in the same story Friday.Our imprecision in saying LSU wide receivers coach D.J. McCarthy paid junior defensive lineman Akiem Hicks to transfer to LSU likely gave readers an idea that may or may not reflect the severity of the circumstances of the possible violations currently under investigation.We should also have given the Athletic Department an opportunity to respond to the allegations, and our failure to do so was unfair to both the Department and our readers.
“We’re not going to comment on the details of the investigation beyond the statements that have already been made,” Herb Vincent, associate vice chancellor for University Relations and senior associate athletic director, told The Daily Reveille on Friday. “We are very concerned about a number of inaccuracies we have seen in this story. We are not at liberty to discuss at this time the specific details.”While we may have published the story in haste, we stand by our pursuit of the details behind the current investigation.We will move forward from this with lessons learned, improve our coverage of the possible violations and athletics as a whole and intensify our search for further details ideally without any further missteps.—-Contact the Editorial Board at [email protected]