UConn kicker, linebacker arrested in campus fight coach calls ‘crazy stuff that kids will do’

2 UConn football players arrested in campus fight

STORRS, Conn. — A fight between the University of Connecticut football team’s place kicker and a backup linebacker led to the arrests of both Tuesday on charges of breach of the peace.

Kicker David Teggart, 21, and linebacker Jerome Williams, 20, were arrested just after midnight and were charged with misdemeanors following a fight in a parking lot at the Hilltop Apartments complex, where about 1,200 students live.

UConn coach Randy Edsall said Teggart, of Northborough, Mass., and Williams, of Burlington Township, N.J., were fighting each other. He called the tussle “crazy stuff that kids will do” and said any discipline will be handled internally, although neither player had been suspended from the team.

“I don’t like what happened, but at least there was no one else involved,” Edsall said. “It was just those two guys. No one got hurt. No one’s got black eyes, none of that stuff. So it was like a cat fight.”

Edsall bemoaned the fact that police were involved. He said when he was a child and got into a disagreement with his brother, his father would send them to the basement to put boxing gloves on.

“Nowadays, as we all know, whenever there’s a spat, they don’t just tell you to go home or anything like that, you get arrested,” he said. “You get written up, you know, breach of peace.”

Teggart and Williams were released on $500 bonds and are due in court Oct. 12.

UConn, which must approve media requests to interview players on its athletic teams, didn’t make the players available for comment Tuesday.

Defensive end Kendall Reyes, a team captain, said the UConn team has become very close since the stabbing death of teammate Jasper Howard during a fight on campus a year ago. He said, like in every family, there are occasional disagreements.

“There’s nothing wrong with conflict, it’s part of the family,” he said. “You’ve got to have intensity on a team. When we’re not fighting, that’s when you should be concerned.”

Teggart, who’s listed as 6 feet tall and 207 pounds, has hit seven of his 11 field goal attempts this season and leads the Huskies with 35 points. Williams, who’s 5-foot-11 and 233 pounds, has played in two games and has five tackles.

UConn (2-2) faces Vanderbilt (1-2) on Saturday.