Wisconsin football: one freshman RB suspended, another dismissed [UPDATED]

On Tuesday afternoon, Brian Mason, the assistant Director of Brand Communications for Football at Wisconsin, sent out a short email that stated freshman running back Loyal Crawford has been dismissed from the team and freshman running back Antwan Roberts has been suspended by head coach Paul Chryst.

Here is the statement from UW in its entirety:

Aug. 31, 2021

MADISON, Wis. — Freshman running back Loyal Crawford has been dismissed from the Wisconsin football team, head coach Paul Chryst announced Tuesday.

Additionally, Chryst announced that freshman running back Antwan Roberts has been suspended.

Wisconsin Athletics and the football program will have no further comment on the matters.

— #OnWisconsin —

There had been no rumblings that I saw on any of the message boards about this, so it comes as quite the surprise just a few days before the first game of the season.

Crawford, out of Eau Claire, and Roberts, out of Tennessee, were both members of the 2021 recruiting class for UW. The Badgers have two other freshmen running backs with Braelon Allen and Jackson Acker still on the roster. Neither Crawford nor Roberts were expected to see the field much this season.

We will update you if we hear anything else about this.

UPDATE, Tuesday, 8/31/21, 5:30 p.m. CT:

There have been a couple of new developments in this story. First, Crawford took to Twitter to defend himself claiming that he had been “treated so unfairly” and that Roberts jumped him in his dorm room.

Then the UWPD released some information that said Crawford had a knife during the incident, but none of the injuries were because of it. He was cited for criminal disorderly conduct and disorderly conduct while armed.

We have reached out to Crawford but he has not responded yet.