Parker wanted to be very clear that the school, the athletics department, and the hockey program believe in transparency.
Parker was forthright when discussing Corey Trivino, who was arrested for sexual assault Dec. 11. Parker doesn’t believe the incidents are symptomatic of a larger problem.
“I hope it’s a horrible coincidence,’’ said Parker. “I don’t want this to be the culture of our team and if it is, we’ll change it. We’ve had problems in the past but we’ve dealt with them and gotten rid of kids we didn’t want in our program, whether it be drinking, school or a whole bunch of things but we’ve had a few instances and dealt with kids and removed them from our program because they weren’t living up to our standards and that’s how we will look at Max. Is this the culture of the BU hockey team? Is this the culture of BU athletics? If it is, the buck stops here. But I don’t believe it is.’’
Parker said the standards at BU are high and for student-athletes, they’re even higher.
“Not just BU hockey but BU athletics in general, all the coaches hold these kids to a higher standard [in terms of] how they conduct themselves academically, and on the playing fields and in society,’’ said Parker. “We want to make sure we hold them to that standard and if anybody falls below it, we deal with it. I don’t think anybody has ever thought that Boston University in general, or the BU hockey team in particular, covered anything up or tried to quiet things down and keep it in house just so a kid can play another game. That’s not our M.O. That’s never been my M.O. and we deal with individual cases as they come. There are going to be bad instances, no question, and when they happen, we deal with them and I think we’ve dealt with them appropriately over the years and we’ll deal with this one appropriately but there’s nothing to be dealt with right now other than the suspension until we see what happens.’’
Parker said that unlike Trivino, who had issues with alcohol, Nicastro had not been in trouble.
