COLLEGE PARK, Md. — The University of Maryland football team burst onto the field before Saturday’s game against Michigan State and sprinted to the opposite end. Then the players knelt around a large “79” painted on the ground behind one end zone.
It is a ritual they have repeated before each home game this season. In June, Jordan McNair, a 19-year-old offensive lineman who wore No. 79, died two weeks after collapsing during a team workout.
But everything else about the past week was different: the conclusion of two separate investigations, one into McNair’s death and one into the football program’s culture under Coach D.