BOWLING GREEN, Ohio — Memphis' Jamirah Shutes pled not guilty to an assault charge stemming from her now-infamous handshake line punching of a Bowling Green player after their WNIT loss, court documents revealed Wednesday.
Shutes, being tried in the Bowling Green Municipal Court on the charge, pled not guilty Tuesday.
Thursday night as the teams walked toward center court following Bowling Green's 73-60 win in the Round of 16 game, Shutes stopped to talk with Falcons' player Elissa Brett. After a short conversation, Shutes appears to throw a punch at Brett's face. Brett fell toward the scorer's table and onto the sideline.
There was no immediate word about what caused the confrontation or if any player was seriously injured.
Memphis' athletics department said Friday that the incident was "extremely unfortunate and certainly not consistent with, or representative of, our expectations for our programs and student-athletes."
"Because the incident occurred after the game, jurisdiction falls in the hands of local authorities, and we are cooperating fully with their process," the statement said. "To be respectful of that process, we will not comment further until it is complete."
Bowling Green said in a earlier statement Thursday night that the incident was in the hands of the campus police.
"The incident that took place following tonight's home WNIT game has been turned over to the BGSU Police Department," the school said. "Bowling Green State University Athletics does not make comments about active police investigations. Our priority is with the health, safety and support of our student-athletes."
Bowling Green coach Robyn Fralich didn't directly comment on the incident after the game, saying only that they were "figuring all those things out," as far as what happened in the handshake line.
The Commercial Appeal reported that Shutes, who leads the Tigers in scoring, took an elbow to her face with 24 seconds left in the opening quarter and played just eight minutes in the first half. She returned to start the second half.
Shutes, a fifth-year player who finished with 13 points in her final game with the Tigers, was a second-team All-AAC selection this season.
Brett scored 15 points in the win.
