Reduced Suspensions for Todd Day, 3 Other Arkansas Basketball Players

The one-year suspensions given to four Arkansas basketball players involved in a sexual incident on campus were reduced Wednesday.

Forward Todd Day and three teammates will be held out until December, meaning they will miss a tournament in Hawaii and perhaps some nonconference games, Arkansas system President B. Alan Sugg said.

Day and teammates Darrell Hawkins, Elmer Martin and Roosevelt Wallace were suspended from the basketball team for a year by the All University Judicial Board. They couldn’t play or practice under the ruling, which was appealed to Sugg.

A 34-year-old Springdale woman told police she was sexually assaulted at the athletic dormitory Feb. 27, and identified the four players. The woman, who police said was drunk, did not press charges and prosecutor Andrew Ziser said evidence wasn’t sufficient to file charges. The players conceded they had sex with the woman but said she consented.

Sugg said his review of the hearing before the judicial board convinced him that the woman consented. He declined to comment on the board’s decision, but indicated that the issue of consent was the main point of difference between Sugg and the board.