What's Said In This Locker Room, Stays in this Locker Room: Restricting the Social Media Use of Collegiate Athletes and the Implications for their Institutions

INTRODUCTION ..................................................................................... 421 I. STUDENT SPEECH ............................................................................... 423 A. Tinker and its descendants .................................................... 423 B. The complexities of speech on college campuses ................. 426 C. Public vs. private institutions ................................................ 429 II. SOCIAL MEDIA, SPEECH AND COLLEGE SPORTS ................................ 432 A. Bridging the gap from traditional First Amendment analysis to the Internet ........................................................ 433 1. Borrowing from the Pickering balancing test ................. 433 2. First Amendment analysis of social media ..................... 434 III. EVALUATING THE CASES ................................................................. 436 Case No. 1: Oklahoma player suspended after Tweets encouraging Austin residents to commit suicide ................ 436 Case No. 2: Kentucky player and coach squabble through Twitter ................................................................................ 437 Case No. 3: Texas kicks player off team after racist Facebook posts .................................................................................... 439 IV. LITIGATION STRATEGIES ................................................................. 440 V. CONCLUSION .................................................................................... 443