Montana guard Will Cherry was reportedly arrested in downtown Missoula this morning, charged with disorderly conduct and resisting arrest. Sophomore guard Keron DeShields and a third man were also detained by Missoula police. DeShields is charged with disorderly conduct, and the third man, Jason Shawn Snyder, with possession of marijuana and drug paraphernalia.
The incident apparently occurred in a Front Street bar around 2:04 Saturday morning. The Missoulian newspaper is reporting that the local police responded to a report of a fight between the three men, and that Cherry - a three-time All Big Sky selection - had to be tased before he submitted.
Resisting arrest, indeed.
The bar has attracted a fair amount of trouble recently, according to the newspaper report, which quoted Montana AD Kent Haslam:That same area was the scene last weekend of a disturbance involving an assistant UM football coach and a football player. Because a business owner declined to press charges, their names were not released. But UM officials said the coach has been sanctioned and that the player was interviewed.
“We’ve talked to the football player and there are privacy issues that deal with that since there was no police report or charges filed,” Haslam said. “We feel like we have a good idea of exactly what happened. A lot of it, to be honest with you, was horseplay and some silly decisions, that type of thing. We will take care of that through the student code of conduct as well.”
Now, when I was in college, I could have been accused of a certain amount of horseplay and silly decisions.
But I never had to be tased. Not even once.
Cherry is on course to graduate from Montana in a couple of weeks, but DeShields may find his future with the team in the balance as the incident is adjudicated.
Eric Angevine is the editor of Storming the Floor. He tweets @stfhoops.