The 58-year-old college basketball analyst recently got into a heated Twitter feud with multiple college professors regarding Duke freshman Jalen Johnson’s decision to opt out of the rest of the season. When asked about Dakich’s status with the network, an ESPN spokesperson issued the following statement (via USA Today’s Dan Wolken): “We are taking this matter very seriously and are in the process of looking into it.”
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Here’s how it all started: Nathan Kalman-Lamb, a lecturing fellow at Duke University, posted a series of tweets criticizing members of the media, including Dakich, who reacted to Johnson’s announcement by “punching down on an unpaid campus athletic worker.”
Dakich went back and forth on Twitter with Kalman-Lamb until Dakich eventually blocked him.
Additionally, Dakich engaged with Andrew McGregor, a professor of history at the Mountain View Campus of Dallas College, and Johanna Mellis, an assistant professor in the history department at Ursinus College.
The feud escalated when Dakich took it to the airwaves. As part of a long monologue, Dakich spelled out Kalman-Lamb’s name on air, listed his office hours and called him a “D-bag.” He also referenced a Mellis tweet about going at it “in the pool” — Mellis was a Division I swimmer at the College of Charleston — which Mellis perceived as a threat of sexual violence.
From “The Dan Dakich Show” on The Fan 93.5 and 107.5 in Indianapolis:
Dakich, who has faced backlash for his on-air response and social media posts, briefly deactivated his Twitter before returning Sunday night.
“And I said, ‘outside the arena,’ and then she wanted to, quote, ‘go at in the pool.’ Well, if you go at it in a pool, it’s a public place, and then I’m gonna have to get divorced, and then it’s gonna be just a problem.”
He has not yet directly addressed ESPN’s investigation of his comments.
