By Robert J. Romano, Senior Writer, JD, LLM, St. John’s University
Longtime Women Ice Hockey Coach, Katey Stone, filed a federal lawsuit with the U.S. District Court, District of Massachusetts against the President and Fellows of Harvard College based on sex discrimination, claiming that the school forced her to resign as its Head Women’s Ice Hockey Coach over false misconduct allegations and that the university has historically underpaid female coaches. Coach Stone’s eight-count complaint alleges Sex/Gender Discrimination in violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, Discrimination on the Basis of Sex/Gender in violation of Mass. General Law Chapter 151B, Failure to Pay Equal Wages in violation of the Federal Equal Pay Act of 1963, Failure to Pay Equal Wages in violation of Massachusetts Act to Establish Pay Equity, Retaliation, Defamation, Civil Conspiracy, and Intentional Interference with Contractual Relations.[1]
With over 500 career wins, Coach Stone is a highly regarded women’s hockey coach both within the United States and abroad. As Harvard’s Head Coach since the 1994-95 season, Stone’s teams have won nine Ivy League Championships, six ECAC tournament championships, eight ECAC regular season championships, have made it to the NCAA tournament twelve times, reached the Frozen Four six times and the NCAA Championship four times. In addition, she led the U.S. Women’s Ice Hockey Team to a silver medal in the 2014 Winter Olympic Games in Sochi, Russia.[2]
But with success, comes controversy and after her 29th season with the Crimson, Coach Stone resigned due to an investigation by the university that her coaching practices created a toxic environment for the student-athletes who played under her. Specifically, there were allegations of various forms of mistreatment that included insensitivity to mental health issues, downplaying injuries, leading derogatory chants and creating a climate where athletes were pitted against each other to curry favor with her and the other members of the coaching staff.
Harvard’s investigation came on the heels of reports published in the Boston Globe and The Athletic which quoted former Harvard ice hockey players contending that Stone willingly turned a blind eye to harmful and possible injurious hazing practices among athletes on her team. Specifically, The Athletic reported in March 2023 that worrisome hazing of new team members was occurring under Coach Stone’s watch that included initiation rituals of forced alcohol consumption and sexualized skits and traditions, including an annual occurrence entitled naked skate that left some team members with “ice burns and bleeding nipples.”[3] In addition, the reports cite former players who alleged that Stone used discriminatory language, including once saying that there were “too many chiefs and not enough Indians” on the team while looking at an Indigenous player.[4]
Coach Stone claims that the allegations of hazing were false and points to an internal investigation commissioned by the school’s Athletic Director that did not find, after an exhaustive survey, that a “culture of hazing” existed on the women’s ice hockey team. Nonetheless, Coach Stone claims that Harvard endorsed these false accusations and narratives and used them to push her out of her role as the team’s head coach. Specifically, Coach Stone claims that she received unfair treatment compared to her male counterparts who were permitted by Harvard hierarchy “to use their discretion in how best to coach and motivate the players on their respective teams . . . while she was harshly punished and excoriated for engaging in the same coaching strategies and behaviors.” Coach Stone has gone on to describe Harvard’s actions as “part and parcel of a larger culture at the University wherein female coaches are undervalued, underpaid, heavily scrutinized, and held to a breathtakingly more stringent standard of behavior than their male counterparts.”[5]
Whether such allegations of hazing and abuse were or were not part of the culture of the women’s ice hockey team under Coach Stone that led to her leaving the team as its head coach may become legally moot, however, because the university on October 7, 2024, moved to dismiss the complaint in its entirety. The rationale behind Harvard’s motion is twofold – a) they believe that most of Stone’s claims fall outside the statute of limitation, and b) that “the factual allegations in the Complaint do not plausibly point in the direction of discrimination and away from the ‘obvious alternative explanation’ that Stone was separated from Harvard due to mounting concerns regarding her conduct as head coach — concerns that were publicized.”[6]
[1] Case 1:24-cv-11897 Document 1 Filed 07/23/24.
[2] Coach Stone did not coach the Harvard women’s team during its 2013-2014 season as she stepped away to coach the U.S. Olympic Women’s Hockey Team.
[3] https://www.athleticbusiness.com/magazine/30510
[4] Id. Note: At the time of the alleged comments, there were two Native American players and a Native American coach who were part of Harvard Women’s Ice Hockey team. Coach Stone claimed in her lawsuit that at the time of the incident she “immediately paused, recognized her poor word choice, apologized to the players in attendance.”
[5] https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/5653911/2024/07/23/katey-stone-harvard-hockey-lawsuit/
[6] Case 1:24-cv-11897 Motion to Dismiss Filed 10/07/24.
