An oversight group found that Texas girls’ volleyball coach Ryan Richardson engaged in sexual misconduct with a minor, among other allegations, and banned him.
asserted
Richardson → find → him
One mother alleged that Richardson began having sex with her daughter, one of his players, when she was 16 and he was 36.
asserted
he → allege → players
Despite the ban, major sports organizations failed to keep him from interacting with children even as allegations of inappropriate behavior and abuse piled up.
asserted
allegations → fail → behavior
These highlights were written by the reporters and editors who worked on this story.
asserted
who → write → story
The first time Ryan Richardson was suspended from coaching volleyball, in early 2024, he gathered the parents of his teenage players in the back room of his gym in the border city of Pharr, Texas.
asserted
he → suspend → Pharr
It was a dark, cool space, one wall lined with shelves of trophies and dangling medals.
asserted
It → line → trophies
The tinted windows looked out onto the courts where Richardson trained some of the best young female players in the Rio Grande Valley, but the glass was one-way, and
asserted
glass → look → Valley
from outside, nothing that happened in the room was visible.
asserted
that → happen → room
For years, the room had also contained a twin-sized mattress that sat in the corner on a box spring, covered with dark sheets.
asserted
that → contain → sheets
By the 2024 season, though, the bed had disappeared.
asserted
bed → disappear → season
Their 14- and 15-year-old daughters were bound for the Girls Junior National Championship that summer in Las Vegas, but now Richardson was barred from attending.
asserted
Richardson → bind → Vegas
The organization overseeing volleyball in the state, Lone Star Region Volleyball, had suspended him after complaints about Richardson’s Instagram posts, including a mirror selfie in which he posed in skin-tight orange boxer briefs.
asserted
he → oversee → briefs
The case had quickly been escalated to USA Volleyball, the sport’s governing body and the host of the upcoming national championship.
asserted
case → escalate → championship
For more than 15 years at the helm of Texas Fierce Elite, Richardson had been trading on a dream: girls who wanted to play college sports, and parents who wanted to get them there.
asserted
who → trade → them
In Pharr and the cities surrounding it, which are more than 90% Latino and have poverty rates more than double the national average, opportunities to go to college were rare, and paying for it was even harder.
asserted
paying → surround → it
Richardson’s players said he often told them that he and Texas Fierce Elite were their only path to a scholarship.
asserted
he → say → scholarship
Although they were barely in high school, the Texas Fierce Elite girls were entering the most important period of college recruiting.
asserted
girls → enter → recruiting
The sidelines of the national tournament would be flooded with college scouts from all corners of the country.
asserted
sidelines → flood → country
If Richardson could no longer coach, the parents feared, all of that might be derailed.
uncertain
all → coach → that
On that day in the back room of his gym, Richardson did not acknowledge the Instagram posts at all, according to two parents present.
uncertain
Richardson → acknowledge → parents
Instead, the former football receiver claimed that the suspension was the result of vindictive parents with complaints about their kids’ playing time.
asserted
suspension → claim → time
He promised the suspension would go away in a matter of weeks.
asserted
suspension → promise → weeks
And even if it didn’t, Richardson told them, he would find a way to keep coaching.
asserted
he → do → way
The suspension didn’t go away.
asserted
suspension → go → ?
Instead, it surfaced a flood of allegations far more serious than Instagram photos: One mother would allege that Richardson had been having a sexual relationship with her daughter that began four years ago, when the girl was 16 and he was 36, she told ProPublica and The Washington Post.
asserted
she → surface → ProPublica
Other players would come forward to say Richardson had groomed and physically and emotionally abused them.
asserted
Richardson → come → them
USA Volleyball referred the case to the U.S. Center for SafeSport, an oversight body created to police abuse in youth and Olympic sports, which eventually suspended Richardson and put his name on its public disciplinary list.
asserted
which → refer → list
Richardson was right about one thing, however: None of that mattered.
asserted
None → matter → that
Although he was barred from attending USA Volleyball events, including nationals, Richardson was able to keep coaching his teams of teenage girls.
asserted
Richardson → bar → girls
He attended daily practices and appeared on the sidelines of tournaments hosted by other volleyball groups for two years.
asserted
He → attend → years
In February of this year, SafeSport listed Richardson as “permanently ineligible” to coach, saying it had substantiated a litany of allegations against him: that he had had an intimate relationship with a minor, committed sexual misconduct involving a minor, and engaged in physical misconduct and bullying.
asserted
he → list → misconduct
But Richardson is still coaching teenage girls at his gym in Pharr.
asserted
Richardson → coach → Pharr
Nearly every day for the last two years, Richardson has posted videos in which he works with Texas Fierce Elite players, supervises practices and promotes the club — hundreds of posts in all, often visible to the public.
asserted
he → post → public
After his suspension in early 2024, Richardson said complaints against him were an effort to “retaliate and defame someone’s character,” telling the local news website MyRGV that he “would never do anything to risk the physical or mental wellbeing of these strong young ladies.”
asserted
he → say → ladies
He called himself an “enthusiastic proponent” of SafeSport and the strict rules it has in place to protect children.
asserted
it → call → children
“I am extremely surprised by the suspension and disappointed that I have not been given any information regarding what I allegedly did wrong,” he said at the time.
uncertain
he → surprise → time
“The safety and security of the athletes that train with Texas Fierce Elite Volleyball is always my primary focus and concern.”
asserted
that → train → Volleyball
Richardson, who has not been charged with any crime, did not respond to multiple requests for comment for this story.
asserted
who → charge → story
Last week, after ProPublica and The Post sent him a detailed summary of our reporting, Richardson posted a video of a girl training at his gym on Instagram with the caption, “Say what you want but this work will be on display for as long as I live !!
asserted
I → send → display
Not interested in answering to the narrative created by outsiders just invested into the next one who is looking for change!!”
asserted
who → answer → change
…and 239 more, not listed.
