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Syracuse University & Jim Boeheim Settles Slander Lawsuit With Bernie Fine Accusers

This doesn't solve anything, but, it at least closes the door on one aspect of the scandal.

By Sean Keeley
Brett Carlsen/Getty Images

Another chapter in the never-really-over Bernie Fine saga comes to a close. Syracuse University & Jim Boeheim have settled the slander lawsuit brought against them by Fine accusers Bobby Davis and Mike Lang.

Here's the official statement from the school.

For a qucick TL;DR recap, the initial slander lawsuit was thrown out in 2011 by two courts but was later overturned in the Court of Appeals. It was only natural to assume SU would want to settle out of court rather than prolong things and take their chances. Especially since that could have opened them up to releasing documents and other private items.

As for what Jim Boeheim said to get himself in all this trouble, here's his not-at-all-now-ironic comments.

"The Penn State thing came out and the kid behind this is trying to get money," Boeheim said back in 2011. "He's tried before. And now he's trying again. If he gets this, he's going to sue the university and Bernie. What do you think is going to happen at Penn State? You know how much money is going to be involved in civil suits? I'd say about $50 million. That's what this is about. Money."

Also as a reminder, Mike Lang was overheard saying he was "kind of glad Boeheim won that case" when the lawsuit was thrown out initially.

Do this ultimately solve anything or get us any closer to the truth of what happened with Bernie Fine? Not at all. But it made Jim Boeheim's unfortunate comments into the perfect O. Henry story.

It'll be interesting to see how ESPN covers the story. In a recent retrospective of Outside The Lines, a segment that recapped the show's history of sexual abuse stories neglected to include the Bernie Fine story altogether. That's a strange choice considering it was their story, they broke the news. So clearly there's some kind of internal edict to minimize the scandal at this point.

Cue a letter to the Post-Standard editor from Zach Tomaselli's "grandmother" in 3...2...

Oh man, all these wonderful references are coming flooding back to me. So much "fun" this whole sordid saga was...

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