Georgia Releases Statement in Response to Otis Reese's Claims

Otis Reese released a statment tuesday night with allegations towards UGA and Kirby Smart. UGA released a statement in response to those allegations.

Former Georgia defensive back, now Ole Miss defensive back, Otis Reese released a statement addressed to the NCAA Tuesday evening that had some rather harsh allegations towards the University of Georgia and their head football coach Kirby Smart. 

The school released a statement this morning in response to those allegations: 

We cannot comment on student-athlete eligibility matters due to federal privacy laws, but we would be happy to share our full response to Otis Reese’s waiver request, if he provides a signed release allowing us to do so.

UGA disputes any suggestion that it maintains an unsafe, unsupportive, or racially insensitive environment.

This statement clearly shows that Georgia has no problems releases the details of their waiver response though that has to be done through a signed released from Otis Reese first. 

This statement comes after Reese claims that Georgia's head coach Kirby Smart manipulated him during the 2019 season into playing during what he called his "Darkest moment" 

"Then when I chose to leave the team, I was led to believe by Coach Smart that if I finished the season and not "Let my team down" as he requested, he would support both my decision to transfer and my request to be immediately eligible. (The NCAA has at text message from myself to Coach Smart which verifies my intent to leave on Oct 4th of last season, in which I was manipulated to play the very next day, when I truly was at my darkest moment.) 

As for the racially insensitive environment, Reese claimed that several of his classmates displayed racist behavior on multiple occasions. Reese said one of his teammates and closest friends was called the N-word, while another group of students "mocked slavery and pretended to whip each other." He went on to say that both of these events were done in public and neither event was addressed by the coaching staff at UGA. 

You can follow us for future coverage by clicking "Follow" on the top righthand corner of the page. Also, be sure to like us on Facebook @BulldogMaven & follow us on Twitter at @DawgsDailySI.