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QuoteManti Te'o's Dead Girlfriend, The Most Heartbreaking And Inspirational Story Of The College Football Season, Is A Hoax
Timothy Burke and Jack Dickey

Notre Dame's Manti Te'o, the stories said, played this season under a terrible burden. A Mormon linebacker who led his Catholic school's football program back to glory, Te'o was whipsawed between personal tragedies along the way. In the span of six hours in September, as Sports Illustrated told it, Te'o learned first of the death of his grandmother, Annette Santiago, and then of the death of his girlfriend, Lennay Kekua.

Kekua, 22 years old, had been in a serious car accident in California, and then had been diagnosed with leukemia. SI's Pete Thamel described how Te'o would phone her in her hospital room and stay on the line with her as he slept through the night. "Her relatives told him that at her lowest points, as she fought to emerge from a coma, her breathing rate would increase at the sound of his voice," Thamel wrote.

Upon receiving the news of the two deaths, Te'o went out and led the Fighting Irish to a 20-3 upset of Michigan State, racking up 12 tackles. It was heartbreaking and inspirational. Te'o would appear on ESPN's College GameDay to talk about the letters Kekua had written him during her illness. He would send a heartfelt letter to the parents of a sick child, discussing his experience with disease and grief. The South Bend Tribune wrote an article describing the young couple's fairytale meeting—she, a Stanford student; he, a Notre Dame star—after a football game outside Palo Alto.

Did you enjoy the uplifiting story, the tale of a man who responded to adversity by becoming one of the top players of the game? If so, stop reading.

Manti Te'o did lose his grandmother this past fall. Annette Santiago died on Sept. 11, 2012, at the age of 72, according to Social Security Administration records in Nexis. But there is no SSA record there of the death of Lennay Marie Kekua, that day or any other. Her passing, recounted so many times in the national media, produces no obituary or funeral announcement in Nexis, and no mention in the Stanford student newspaper.

Nor is there any report of a severe auto accident involving a Lennay Kekua. Background checks turn up nothing. The Stanford registrar's office has no record that a Lennay Kekua ever enrolled. There is no record of her birth in the news. Outside of a few Twitter and Instagram accounts, there's no online evidence that Lennay Kekua ever existed.

The photographs identified as Kekua—in online tributes and on TV news reports—are pictures from the social-media accounts of a 22-year-old California woman who is not named Lennay Kekua. She is not a Stanford graduate; she has not been in a severe car accident; and she does not have leukemia. And she has never met Manti Te'o.
* * *

Here is what we know about Manti Te'o: He is an exceptional football player. He's a projected first-round NFL pick. He finished second in the Heisman voting, and he won a haul of other trophies: the Walter Camp, the Chuck Bednarik, the Butkus, the Bronko Nagurski. In each of his three seasons as a full-time starter, he racked up at least 100 tackles.

We also know that Te'o is a devout Mormon. When asked why he picked Notre Dame over Southern California, the school he had supported while growing up in Hawaii, he said he prayed on it. "Faith," he told ESPN, "is believing in something that you most likely can't see, but you believe to be true. You feel in your heart, and in your soul, that it's true, but you still take that leap."

We know, further, that Te'o adores his family. Te'o's father said that Manti had revered his grandfather, who died in January 2012, since the day he was born. He ran his sister's post-graduation luau. And he loved his late maternal grandmother, Annette Santiago. (Here's her obituary.)

But that's where the definite ends. From here, the rest of Te'o's public story begins to grade into fantasy, in the tradition of so much of Notre Dame's mythmaking and with the help of a compliant press.

Assembling a timeline of the Kekua-Te'o relationship is difficult. As Te'o's celebrity swelled, so did the pile of inspirational stories about his triumph over loss. Each ensuing story seemed to add yet another wrinkle to the narrative, and details ran athwart one another. Here is the general shape of things, based on occasionally contradictory media accounts:

Nov. 28, 2009: Te'o and Kekua meet after Stanford's 45-38 victory over Notre Dame in Palo Alto, according to the South Bend Tribune: "Their stares got pleasantly tangled, then Manti Te'o extended his hand to the stranger with a warm smile and soulful eyes." Kekua, a Stanford student, swaps phone numbers with Te'o.

2010-2011: Te'o and Kekua are friends. "She was gifted in music, multi-lingual, had dreams grounded in reality and the talent to catch up to them" (South Bend Tribune). "They started out as just friends," Te'o's father, Brian, told the Tribune in October 2012. "Every once in a while, she would travel to Hawaii, and that happened to be the time Manti was home, so he would meet with her there."

Early 2012: Te'o and Kekua become a couple. They talk on the phone nightly, according to ESPN.

Some time in 2012: Kekua has a car accident somewhere in California that leaves her "on the brink of death" (Sports Illustrated). But when? Eight months before she died of cancer, in September, reports ESPN. "About the time Kekua and Manti became a couple," reports the South Bend Tribune. April 28, reports SI.

June 2012: As Kekua recovers from her injuries, doctors discover she has leukemia. She has a bone-marrow transplant. ("That was just in June," Brian Te'o told the South Bend Tribune in October of 2012. "I remember Manti telling me later she was going to have a bone marrow transplant and, sure enough, that's exactly what happened. From all I knew, she was doing really, really well.")

Summer 2012: Her condition improves. Kekua "eventually" graduates from Stanford, according to the South Bend Tribune. (A New York Times story, published Oct. 13, identifies her as a "Stanford alumnus.") She soon takes a turn for the worse. At some point, she enters treatment, apparently at St. Jude Medical Center in Fullerton, Calif. (In a letter obtained by Fox Sports published Oct. 25, Te'o writes to the parents of a girl dying of cancer: "My girlfriend, when she was at St. Jude's in LA, she had a little friend.")

Te'o talks to Lennay nightly, "going to sleep while on the phone with her," according to Sports Illustrated. "When he woke up in the morning his phone would show an eight-hour call, and he would hear Lennay breathing on the other end of the line."

Sept. 10, 2012: Kekua is released from the hospital; Manti's father, Brian, congratulates her "via telephone" (South Bend Tribune).

Sept. 11-12, 2012: Te'o's grandmother dies in Hawaii. Later, Kekua dies in California. Or is it the other way around? "Te'o's girlfriend, Lennay Kekua, died Sept. 11 of complications from leukemia. His grandma, Annette Santiago, died after a long illness less than 24 hours later," according to the Sept. 22 South Bend Tribune. No, Annette dies first, according to the Oct. 12 South Bend Tribune. In fact, Lennay lives long enough to express condolences over the death of Annette:

    Less than 48 hours later [after Lennay's release from the hospital], at 4 a.m. Hawaii time, Kekua sent a text to Brian and Ottilia, expressing her condolences over the passing of Ottilia's mom, Annette Santiago, just hours before.

    Brian awakened three hours later, saw the text, and sent one back. There was no response. A couple of hours later, Manti called his parents, his heart in pieces.

    Lennay Kekua had died.

Or does Kekua die three days later (New York Post)? Four days (ESPN, CBS)?

In any case, according to Te'o's interview with Gene Wojciechowski in a segment aired during the Oct. 6 episode of College GameDay, Lennay's last words to Te'o were "I love you."

Sept. 12, 2012 (morning): Te'o is informed of his grandmother's passing (Sports Illustrated).

Sept. 12, 2012 (afternoon): Te'o is informed of Kekua's passing by her older brother, Koa (Sports Illustrated).

Sept. 15, 2012: Te'o records 12 tackles in leading the Irish to an upset win over Michigan State.

Sept. 22, 2012: Kekua's funeral takes place in Carson, Calif. (The Associated Press puts it in "Carson City, Calif.," which does not exist.) Te'o skips the funeral, saying Kekua had insisted that he not miss a game (Los Angeles Times). Her casket is closed at 9 a.m. Pacific time, according to Te'o. That night, Notre Dame beats Michigan, 13-6, to go to 4-0, the school's best start in a decade. Te'o intercepts two passes. After the game, he says of Lennay: "All she wanted was some white roses. So I sent her roses and sent her two picks along with that." Notre Dame head coach Brian Kelly awards the game ball to Lennay Kekua, handing it to Te'o to "take back to Hawaii."

* * *

It was around this time that Te'o's Heisman campaign began in earnest, aided in part by the South Bend Tribune. He appeared on the cover of Sports Illustrated's Oct. 1 issue, above the headline, "The Full Manti."

And it was around this time that Manti and his father began filling in details about the linebacker's relationship with Lennay. Brian Te'o told multiple reporters that the family had never met Kekua; the Te'os were supposed to spend time with her when they visited South Bend, Ind., for Notre Dame's Senior Day on Nov. 17. The elder Te'o told the South Bend Tribune in October, "[W]e came to the realization that she could be our daughter-in-law. Sadly, it won't happen now."

Lennay Kekua's death resonated across the college football landscape—especially at Notre Dame, where the community immediately embraced her as a fallen sister. Charity funds were started, and donations poured into foundations dedicated to leukemia research. More than $3,000 has been pledged in one IndieGogo campaign raising money for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society.

Te'o's story moved beyond the world of sports. On the day of the BCS championship game between Notre Dame and Alabama, CBS This Morning ran a three-minute story that featured a direct quote from Lennay Kekua:

    Babe, if anything happens to me, you promise that you'll stay there and you'll play and you'll honor me through the way you play.

CBS also displayed this photo of Kekua several times throughout the piece:

Manti Te'o's Dead Girlfriend, The Most Heartbreaking And Inspirational Story Of The College Football Season, Is A Hoax

This week, we got in touch with a woman living in Torrance, Calif. We'll call her Reba, to protect her identity. She was initially confused, then horrified to find that she had become the face of a dead woman. "That picture," she told us over the phone, "is a picture of me from my Facebook account."
* * *

Manti Te'o and Lennay Kekua did not meet at Stanford in 2009. The real beginning of their relationship apparently occurred on Twitter, as an encounter between @MTeo_5 and @lovalovaloveYOU, on Oct. 10, 2011. Here's the moment they first made contact.

    Manti Te'o

    @MTeo_5

    @LovaLovaloveyou nice to meet u too ma'am
    10 Oct 11

 
Lennay Kekua's Twitter name was @lovalovaloveYOU from 2011 until April 2012, @LennayKay from April until September 2012, and has been @LoveMSMK ever since. Their interactions, by and large, consisted of mild flirting. By January 2012, they were a "couple," and Te'o sprinkled #LMK (for Lennay Marie Kekua) throughout his Twitter timeline in 2012.

As for what Kekua was tweeting, we have only bits and pieces. Her Twitter was private during most of this time, though various Google caches reveal her ever-changing series of avatars and a handful of Twitpics.

All of those photographs—with one important exception—came from the private Facebook and Instagram accounts of Reba, whom we found after an exhaustive related-images search of each of Lennay's images (most of which had been modified in some way to prevent reverse image searching). We sent her a number of photographs that had appeared on Lennay's Twitter account, which is now private but apparently still active (see this retweet, for instance). One picture in particular brought Reba to a start. It had been used briefly as @LoveMSMK's Twitter avatar and later in the background of the page (we've blurred out the face, at Reba's request):

Manti Te'o's Dead Girlfriend, The Most Heartbreaking And Inspirational Story Of The College Football Season, Is A Hoax

Manti Te'o's Dead Girlfriend, The Most Heartbreaking And Inspirational Story Of The College Football Season, Is A Hoax

That photo hadn't appeared on the internet—at least, not to Reba's knowledge. She had taken it in December 2012 and sent it directly to an old high school acquaintance. The two hadn't talked since graduation, but the classmate, whom Reba remembered fondly, contacted her on Facebook with a somewhat convoluted request: His cousin had been in a serious car accident, and he had seen her photos before and thought she was pretty. Would she be so kind as to take a picture of herself holding up a sign reading "MSMK," to put in a slideshow to support the cousin's recovery? (He didn't explain what MSMK meant, and Reba still doesn't know.) Baffled but trusting, Reba made the sign and sent along the photo.

And now here it was on a dead girl's Twitter profile. After googling Lennay Kekua's name, Reba began to piece things together. She called up the classmate. He expressed alarm, Reba told us later, and "immediately began acting weird." "Don't worry about it," he told her. Moments after the phone call, Reba's picture was removed from the @LoveMSMK Twitter profile. Then, in a series of lengthy phone calls, Reba told us everything she knew about the classmate, a star high school quarterback turned religious musician named Ronaiah Tuiasosopo.
* * *

QuoteRonaiah Tuiasosopo comes from a big football family. His father, Titus, played for USC in the late '80s and early '90s. One uncle, Navy, played for the L.A. Rams; another uncle, Mike, coaches the defensive line at Colorado. A cousin from an older generation, Manu, went to Seattle in the first round in 1979; another cousin, Marques, went to Oakland in the second round in 2001. A cousin from a different side of the family, Fred Matua, earned All-America honors at guard for USC and played on several NFL teams, before dying this past August of a heart-related issue. (He was 28.)
Manti Te'o's Dead Girlfriend, The Most Heartbreaking And Inspirational Story Of The College Football Season, Is A HoaxRonaiah Tuiasosopo

Tuiasosopo, now 22, had once been something of a football prospect himself. In 2005, the Los Angeles Daily News wrote that the young Tuiasosopo, then the sophomore starting quarterback for Antelope Valley High School in Lancaster, Calif., "looked like a star" in practice, despite some in-game growing pains. His coach said he was a "great kid" who did a fine job leading the older seniors. He was an honorable mention for the all-league team. But then he transferred out of town, to Franklin High in Stockton, where he spent his junior year living with an aunt and handing the ball off. His team featured two 1,000-yard rushers, and he completed only five passes all season. He transferred again: His senior year, he turned up at Paraclete High in Lancaster. Titus, his father, had become an assistant coach there. That's where he encountered Reba. His team lost in the semifinals. A season recap article suggested that he might sign with Hawaii, but that evidently went nowhere.

Once high school ended, in 2008, Tuiasosopo threw himself into his father's church. Titus is the pastor at the Oasis Christian Church of the Antelope Valley, and Ronaiah leads the church's band. He also has his own little YouTube music career. He sings secular songs, with a cousin (Conan Amituanai, a former Arizona lineman whom the Vikings once signed), and religious songs, both solo and as part of an ensemble. "Ignite," the lead single on the group's ReverbNation page, is a likable enough song. It borrows its chorus from Katy Perry's catchy "Firework." But the song only has 10 Facebook likes, a fairly low figure that seems especially low once one considers who plugged Tuiasosopo's single on Twitter in December 2011: Manti Te'o.

Te'o and Tuiasosopo definitely know each other. In May 2012, Te'o was retweeting Tuiasosopo, who had mentioned going to Hawaii. Wrote Te'o, "sole"—"bro," in Samoan—"u gotta come down." In June, Te'o wished Tuiasosopo a happy birthday. How they know each other isn't clear. We spoke to a woman we'll call Frieda, who had suggested on Twitter back in December that there was something fishy about Lennay Kekua. She was Facebook friends with Titus Tuiasosopo, so we asked her if she knew anything about Ronaiah.

"Manti and Ronaiah are family," she said, "or at least family friends." She told us that the Tuiasosopos had been on-field guests (of Te'o or someone else, she didn't know) for the Nov. 24 Notre Dame-USC game in Los Angeles. USC was unable to confirm this, but a tweet from Tuiasosopo's since-deleted account suggests he and Te'o did see each other on that West Coast trip. "Great night with my bro @MTeo_5! #Heisman #574L," Ronaiah tweeted on Nov. 23, the night before the game.

And there was something else: Tuiasosopo had been in a car accident a month before Lennay's supposed accident.

Was this Lennay Kekua? We spoke with friends and relatives of Ronaiah Tuiasosopo who asserted that Ronaiah was the man behind Lennay. He created Lennay in 2008, one source said, and Te'o wasn't the first person to have an online "relationship" with her. One mark—who had been "introduced" to Lennay by Tuiasosopo—lasted about a month before family members grew suspicious that Lennay could never be found on the telephone, and that wherever one expected Lennay to be, Ronaiah was there instead. Two sources discounted Ronaiah's stunt as a prank that only metastasized because of Te'o's rise to national celebrity this past season.

The hoax began crumbling around the edges late last year. On Nov. 4, 2012, an "U'ilani Rae Kekua," supposedly Lennay's sister, popped up on Twitter under the name @uilanirae. Manti Te'o immediately tweeted out the following:

Manti Te'o's Dead Girlfriend, The Most Heartbreaking And Inspirational Story Of The College Football Season, Is A Hoax

Te'o also wished U'ilani a happy Thanksgiving on Nov. 22.

Numerous Notre Dame fans sent U'ilani messages of condolence, and she responded with thanks. On Nov. 10, U'ilani tweeted the following:

Manti Te'o's Dead Girlfriend, The Most Heartbreaking And Inspirational Story Of The College Football Season, Is A Hoax

A few weeks later, the @uilanirae account was deleted. The deletion came immediately after tweets from two now-suspended Twitter accounts had alleged that U'ilani was a fraud, that the same person behind Lennay was operating the U'ilani account, and that the images of "U'ilani" were really of a woman named Donna Tei.

Tei's Twitter account is @FreDonna51zhun; Fred Matua wore No. 51, and Tei's profile is full of pictures of herself with the late football star (and cousin of Tuiasosopo's). We showed U'ilani's Twitter avatar to one of Tei's friends, and he confirmed it was her.

In yet another now-deleted tweet, Tei herself reached out to Nev Schulman, star of the 2010 film Catfish and executive producer of the MTV program of the same title. Schulman's movie and show are about romantic deception through fake online personas.

Manti Te'o, meanwhile, has deleted his tweets mentioning U'ilani.

* * *

Full size
There was no Lennay Kekua. Lennay Kekua did not meet Manti Te'o after the Stanford game in 2009. Lennay Kekua did not attend Stanford. Lennay Kekua never visited Manti Te'o in Hawaii. Lennay Kekua was not in a car accident. Lennay Kekua did not talk to Manti Te'o every night on the telephone. She was not diagnosed with cancer, did not spend time in the hospital, did not engage in a lengthy battle with leukemia. She never had a bone marrow transplant. She was not released from the hospital on Sept. 10, nor did Brian Te'o congratulate her for this over the telephone. She did not insist that Manti Te'o play in the Michigan State or Michigan games, and did not request he send white flowers to her funeral. Her favorite color was not white. Her brother, Koa, did not inform Manti Te'o that she was dead. Koa did not exist. Her funeral did not take place in Carson, Calif., and her casket was not closed at 9 a.m. exactly. She was not laid to rest.

Lennay Kekua's last words to Manti Te'o were not "I love you."

A friend of Ronaiah Tuiasosopo told us he was "80 percent sure" that Manti Te'o was "in on it," and that the two perpetrated Lennay Kekua's death with publicity in mind. According to the friend, there were numerous photos of Ronaiah Tuiasosopo and Te'o together on Tuiasosopo's now-deleted Instagram account.

The sheer quantity of falsehoods about Manti's relationship with Lennay makes that friend, and another relative of Ronaiah's, believe Te'o had to know the truth. Mostly, though, the friend simply couldn't believe that Te'o would be stupid enough—or Ronaiah Tuiasosopo clever enough—to sustain the relationship for nearly a year.

Since Notre Dame was blown out in the BCS national championship game, Te'o has kept a low profile. He has tweeted sparingly, and he declined an invitation to the Senior Bowl. His father made news recently when he announced on the "Manti Te'o 'Official' Fan Club" Facebook page that he had "black listed" the Honolulu Star-Advertiser, which had carried a photo on its front page of Manti getting bowled over by Alabama's Eddie Lacy in the title game.

Te'o hasn't tweeted at Lennay since Nov. 6, when he wrote:

    Manti Te'o

        ✔

    @MTeo_5

    @LennayKay I miss you!
    6 Nov 12

        Reply
        Retweet
        Favorite

As of this writing, Te'o's Twitter profile carries a quotation from Alexandre Dumas's The Count of Monte Cristo, the great adventure novel about a man in disguise.

    Life is a storm.. You will bask in the sunlight one moment, be shattered on the rocks the next. What makes you a man is what you do when that storm comes.

We called a cellphone for Manti Te'o, but the number we had is not accepting calls. Brian Te'o, Manti's father, was in a meeting when we called, according to a text message he sent in response. Ronaiah Tuiasosopo did not answer his phone or respond to multiple text messages. We left a message with Notre Dame earlier this afternoon. We'll update with comments when and if we get any.

Update (5:17 p.m.): Notre Dame responds:

    On Dec. 26, Notre Dame coaches were informed by Manti Te'o and his parents that Manti had been the victim of what appears to be a hoax in which someone using the fictitious name Lennay Kekua apparently ingratiated herself with Manti and then conspired with others to lead him to believe she had tragically died of leukemia. The University immediately initiated an investigation to assist Manti and his family in discovering the motive for and nature of this hoax. While the proper authorities will continue to investigate this troubling matter, this appears to be, at a minimum, a sad and very cruel deception to entertain its perpetrators.

    Dennis Brown
    University Spokesman | Assistant Vice President

Additional reporting by Dom Cosentino and Tom Ley. Email Tim Burke at [email protected] or find him on Twitter @bubbaprog. Jack Dickey is at [email protected] and @jackdickey.

Quote from: Jacob on January 16, 2013, 06:47:21 PM
Is there a TLDR summary?

QuoteHis father made news recently when he announced on the "Manti Te'o 'Official' Fan Club" Facebook page that he had "black listed" the Honolulu Star-Advertiser, which had carried a photo on its front page of Manti getting bowled over by Alabama's Eddie Lacy in the title game.

QuoteTough to look at this picture of Manti Te'o and Lennay in a warm embrace without being moved to tears l2.yimg.com/bt/api/res/1.2...

— Chris Spags (@ChrisSpags) January 16, 2013

Quote from: jimmy olsen on January 16, 2013, 08:03:14 PM
Either did it for attention or maybe he invented the girlfriend to cover up being gay and the whole thing spiraled out of control.

Quote from: Valmy on January 16, 2013, 09:23:51 PM
Oh so everytime somebody has a phony girlfriend they are just presumed to be gay eh?

Quote from: PDH on January 16, 2013, 09:51:43 PM
Does this mean the Irish will have to forfeit their loss in the National Championship Game?

Quote from: dps on January 16, 2013, 11:16:47 PM
Was there anything actually criminal here?

Quote from: CountDeMoney on January 16, 2013, 09:48:52 PM
Whatever happened to Canadian girlfriends?

Quote from: jimmy olsen on January 17, 2013, 01:34:19 AM
If I was a GM I'd be concerned about drafting a kid this vulnerable to the play action fake.

Quote from: CountDeMoney on January 17, 2013, 08:05:30 AM

Quote from: jimmy olsen on January 17, 2013, 01:34:19 AM
If I was a GM I'd be concerned about drafting a kid this vulnerable to the play action fake.

Your yuks are not appreciated, particularly since I blame you for all of this.

Quote from: CountDeMoney on January 17, 2013, 08:05:30 AM

Quote from: jimmy olsen on January 17, 2013, 01:34:19 AM
If I was a GM I'd be concerned about drafting a kid this vulnerable to the play action fake.

Your yuks are not appreciated, particularly since I blame you for all of this.

QuoteStar linebacker Manti Te'o, whose relationship with a deceased girlfriend was central to the narrative of his Heisman Trophy campaign and Notre Dame's unbeaten regular season, was the victim of an elaborate hoax, the school said Wednesday after a Deadspin story alleged the woman never existed.

In a statement provided by Creative Artists Agency, which signed him as a client last week, Te'o said he had developed an emotional relationship a woman he had met online and was "the victim of what was apparently someone's sick joke."

According to a Notre Dame statement, Te'o and his parents informed the school's coaching staff on Dec. 26 – nearly two weeks before the Fighting Irish lost to Alabama in the BCS National Championship Game – that he had been the victim of a "sad and very cruel deception."

Te'o had talked openly during the season about his supposed relationship with a former Stanford student named Lennay Kekua, whom he claimed in a South Bend Tribune article to have met in 2009 after a football game. Kekua was said to have lost her battle with leukemia on Sept. 12, just hours after Te'o learned that his 72-year old grandmother had passed away.

The story of how Te'o dealt with massive personal tragedy became front and center in his rise to national consciousness. In interviews with Sports Illustrated and on the Jim Rome radio show, Te'o described talking to her by phone through the night as she dealt with the pain of chemotherapy treatments.

"That has to be the hardest thing that I've had to do so far; to be able to operate, and to be able to try to continue with my daily routine, but knowing that I just lost two women that I truly loved," Te'o said at a news conference on Oct. 4. "That was the hardest thing. And the other hardest thing was my girlfriend's service was the day of Michigan's game. And I remember when I found out I knew when they were going to close the casket and all that stuff, and it was during walk thru."

Deadspin's report, however, showed that there were no records of Kekua's death, nor any records that she was a student at Stanford. According to Deadspin, the photos on Kekua's Twitter account belonged to another woman, who was not named.

Te'o's statement contradicted the suggestion by Deadspin that he may have been in on the hoax along with Ronaiah Tuiasosopo, a friend of Teo's who had allegedly provided the picture of the woman.

At minimum, Te'o acknowledged Wednesday that he had never met Kekua in person.

"We maintained what I thought to be an authentic relationship by communicating frequently online and on the phone, and I grew to care deeply about her," Te'o said. "To realize that I was the victim of what was apparently someone's sick joke and constant lies was, and is, painful and humiliating."

Te'o played poorly in Notre Dame's 42-14 loss to Alabama, uncharacteristically missing several tackles. He is currently preparing for the NFL Draft but will not participate at next week's Senior Bowl.

"We know it's a hoax... The only question out there is exactly what Manti knew about it," Timothy Burke, one of the authors of the piece on Deadspin, said during an appearance Wednesday on CBS Radio.

If Notre Dame wants to make another BCS run in 2013 it will need to so without All-American linebacker Manti Te'o.(Photo: Matt Cashore, USA TODAY Sports)

Deadspin traces back the first national mention of Kekua to an article in the Nov. 28, 2009 edition of the South Bend Tribune.

The article quotes a friend of Tuiasosopo's as saying he was "80 percent sure" that Te'o was "in on it," and that "the two perpetrated Lennay Kekua's death with publicity in mind."

"Mostly, though," the articles continues, "the friend simply couldn't believe that Te'o would be stupid enough – or Ronaiah Tuiasosopo clever enough – to sustain the relationship for nearly a year."

Quote from: jimmy olsen on January 17, 2013, 08:35:33 AM

Quote from: CountDeMoney on January 17, 2013, 08:05:30 AM

Quote from: jimmy olsen on January 17, 2013, 01:34:19 AM
If I was a GM I'd be concerned about drafting a kid this vulnerable to the play action fake.

Your yuks are not appreciated, particularly since I blame you for all of this.

At least he met a real girl at the National Championship Game, Miss Tackles.

Quote from: Barrister on January 17, 2013, 10:22:48 AM
Is this going to come back to bite Notre Dame?  Now it comes out they knew about this story for weeks but didn't say anything.

Quote from: merithyn on January 17, 2013, 10:33:30 AM
He was the victim of a hoax.

QuoteLennay Kekua was a Stanford student and Cardinal football fan when the two exchanged glances, handshakes and phone numbers that fateful weekend three seasons ago.

She was gifted in music, multi-lingual, had dreams grounded in reality and the talent to catch up to them.

The plan was for Kekua to spend extensive time with the whole Te'o family when upwards of 40 of them came to South Bend in mid-November for ND's Senior Day date with Wake Forest.

"They started out as just friends," Brian Te'o said. "Every once in a while, she would travel to Hawaii, and that happened to be the time Manti was home, so he would meet with her there. But within the last year, they became a couple.

Quote from: merithyn on January 17, 2013, 10:33:30 AM

Quote from: Barrister on January 17, 2013, 10:22:48 AM
Is this going to come back to bite Notre Dame?  Now it comes out they knew about this story for weeks but didn't say anything.

Why would it? :huh:

He was the victim of a hoax. The media jumped on the story - which was very real to Te'O - and peddled him as this American hero. What, exactly, did Notre Dame or Te-O do wrong that would somehow harm either of them?

Quote from: lustindarkness on January 17, 2013, 10:41:23 AM
I find it hard to believe he was a victim of a hoax here, if he was, he is beyond gullible. Sounds like one of those sick people that make up stuff to get attention. Maybe I am wrong.

Quote from: ulmont on January 17, 2013, 10:40:13 AM

No, he wasn't.  There are articles where Te'o and his family claimed that the two people had met in person:

If it was a hoax, Te'o was in on it.

Quote from: merithyn on January 17, 2013, 10:44:55 AM
I have a feeling that it was more likely that he was embarassed to admit that he only knew her online. There's still one hell of a stigma to that. Then, as the story grew, he embellished to make her more real, probably to himself and to the public. That certainly seems a lot more likely than he was in on some kind of hoax that could potentially ruin his career.

QuoteI notice a ring on Te'o's left hand and when I ask about it, he tells me he wears it to keep his girlfriend, Lennay Kekua, with him always.

"I wish she could tell me how proud she is. I think that's the hardest thing for me. I can't hear her," he offers.

He pauses, touching the ring on his finger.

"I was talking to her sister this morning, and I just wasn't in the mood. And she asked, `Why are you so grumpy in the mornings?' And I said, `You honestly want to know why I'm so grumpy in the mornings? It's because when I wake up, it hits me again that she's not here.' When I wake up, I can't just call her and hear her voice. When I wake up it's not a dream. It's reality.  She's gone."

Quote from: lustindarkness on January 17, 2013, 10:41:23 AM
I find it hard to believe he was a victim of a hoax here, if he was, he is beyond gullible. Sounds like one of those sick people that make up stuff to get attention. Maybe I am wrong.

Quote from: ulmont on January 17, 2013, 10:46:39 AM

Quote from: merithyn on January 17, 2013, 10:44:55 AM
I have a feeling that it was more likely that he was embarassed to admit that he only knew her online. There's still one hell of a stigma to that. Then, as the story grew, he embellished to make her more real, probably to himself and to the public. That certainly seems a lot more likely than he was in on some kind of hoax that could potentially ruin his career.

QuoteI notice a ring on Te'o's left hand and when I ask about it, he tells me he wears it to keep his girlfriend, Lennay Kekua, with him always.

"I wish she could tell me how proud she is. I think that's the hardest thing for me. I can't hear her," he offers.

He pauses, touching the ring on his finger.

"I was talking to her sister this morning, and I just wasn't in the mood. And she asked, `Why are you so grumpy in the mornings?' And I said, `You honestly want to know why I'm so grumpy in the mornings? It's because when I wake up, it hits me again that she's not here.' When I wake up, I can't just call her and hear her voice. When I wake up it's not a dream. It's reality.  She's gone."

http://www.und.com/sports/m-footbl/spec-rel/111612aac.html

That's...quite a bit of embellishing.  Elsewhere Te'o claimed to talk to his girlfriend every single day...

Quote from: lustindarkness on January 17, 2013, 10:47:15 AM
And if he is a victim of a hoax, he is still a liar. He was ashamed to having a internet girlfriend and lied about her, embellished the story, still lying. Liar, not honest, not good, not good Christian...

Quote from: merithyn on January 17, 2013, 10:50:02 AM
The embarassing part for him is that he never met her face-to-face, so he made up a story about how they met.

Quote from: ulmont on January 17, 2013, 10:40:13 AM

Quote from: merithyn on January 17, 2013, 10:33:30 AM
He was the victim of a hoax.

No, he wasn't.  There are articles where Te'o and his family claimed that the two people had met in person:

QuoteLennay Kekua was a Stanford student and Cardinal football fan when the two exchanged glances, handshakes and phone numbers that fateful weekend three seasons ago.

She was gifted in music, multi-lingual, had dreams grounded in reality and the talent to catch up to them.

The plan was for Kekua to spend extensive time with the whole Te'o family when upwards of 40 of them came to South Bend in mid-November for ND's Senior Day date with Wake Forest.

"They started out as just friends," Brian Te'o said. "Every once in a while, she would travel to Hawaii, and that happened to be the time Manti was home, so he would meet with her there. But within the last year, they became a couple.

http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:Gsq3BkqY4-oJ:articles.southbendtribune.com/2012-10-12/sports/34419536_1_brian-and-ottilia-manti-te-o-irish-head-coach+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us

If it was a hoax, Te'o was in on it.

Quote from: jimmy olsen on January 17, 2013, 10:53:35 AM
There are three possibilities, all in which Te'o lied.

1. He's dumb as a sack of hammers and incredibly naive.

The most generous interpretation where Te'o got tricked is that he was embarrassed by "having" an internet girlfriend and embellished things, then when he finally figured out he'd been fooled he was too embarrassed to tell the truth.

2. The gf was a story he told his parents to cover up being gay which slowly spiraled out of control in sitcom like fashion.

3. He's a sociopath who invented the whole thing for more publicity.

Quote from: merithyn on January 17, 2013, 10:55:09 AM
I choose to believe #1 until proven otherwise.  :mad:

Quote from: derspiess on January 17, 2013, 10:57:26 AM

Quote from: merithyn on January 17, 2013, 10:55:09 AM
I choose to believe #1 until proven otherwise.  :mad:

Of course you do, Toots.

Quote from: lustindarkness on January 17, 2013, 11:07:08 AM
Next Meri will tell us women go to computer programming classes.  :rolleyes:

Quote from: lustindarkness on January 17, 2013, 11:07:08 AM
Next Meri will tell us women go to computer programming classes.  :rolleyes:

Quote from: merithyn on January 17, 2013, 10:44:55 AM
That certainly seems a lot more likely than he was in on some kind of hoax that could potentially ruin his career.

Quote from: merithyn on January 17, 2013, 09:56:05 AM
It was a hoax, but played ON him not BY him.

QuoteStar linebacker Manti Te'o, whose relationship with a deceased girlfriend was central to the narrative of his Heisman Trophy campaign and Notre Dame's unbeaten regular season, was the victim of an elaborate hoax, the school said Wednesday after a Deadspin story alleged the woman never existed.

In a statement provided by Creative Artists Agency, which signed him as a client last week, Te'o said he had developed an emotional relationship a woman he had met online and was "the victim of what was apparently someone's sick joke."

According to a Notre Dame statement, Te'o and his parents informed the school's coaching staff on Dec. 26 – nearly two weeks before the Fighting Irish lost to Alabama in the BCS National Championship Game – that he had been the victim of a "sad and very cruel deception."

Te'o had talked openly during the season about his supposed relationship with a former Stanford student named Lennay Kekua, whom he claimed in a South Bend Tribune article to have met in 2009 after a football game. Kekua was said to have lost her battle with leukemia on Sept. 12, just hours after Te'o learned that his 72-year old grandmother had passed away.

The story of how Te'o dealt with massive personal tragedy became front and center in his rise to national consciousness. In interviews with Sports Illustrated and on the Jim Rome radio show, Te'o described talking to her by phone through the night as she dealt with the pain of chemotherapy treatments.

"That has to be the hardest thing that I've had to do so far; to be able to operate, and to be able to try to continue with my daily routine, but knowing that I just lost two women that I truly loved," Te'o said at a news conference on Oct. 4. "That was the hardest thing. And the other hardest thing was my girlfriend's service was the day of Michigan's game. And I remember when I found out I knew when they were going to close the casket and all that stuff, and it was during walk thru."

Deadspin's report, however, showed that there were no records of Kekua's death, nor any records that she was a student at Stanford. According to Deadspin, the photos on Kekua's Twitter account belonged to another woman, who was not named.

Te'o's statement contradicted the suggestion by Deadspin that he may have been in on the hoax along with Ronaiah Tuiasosopo, a friend of Teo's who had allegedly provided the picture of the woman.

At minimum, Te'o acknowledged Wednesday that he had never met Kekua in person.

"We maintained what I thought to be an authentic relationship by communicating frequently online and on the phone, and I grew to care deeply about her," Te'o said. "To realize that I was the victim of what was apparently someone's sick joke and constant lies was, and is, painful and humiliating."

Te'o played poorly in Notre Dame's 42-14 loss to Alabama, uncharacteristically missing several tackles. He is currently preparing for the NFL Draft but will not participate at next week's Senior Bowl.

"We know it's a hoax... The only question out there is exactly what Manti knew about it," Timothy Burke, one of the authors of the piece on Deadspin, said during an appearance Wednesday on CBS Radio.

If Notre Dame wants to make another BCS run in 2013 it will need to so without All-American linebacker Manti Te'o.(Photo: Matt Cashore, USA TODAY Sports)

Deadspin traces back the first national mention of Kekua to an article in the Nov. 28, 2009 edition of the South Bend Tribune.

The article quotes a friend of Tuiasosopo's as saying he was "80 percent sure" that Te'o was "in on it," and that "the two perpetrated Lennay Kekua's death with publicity in mind."

"Mostly, though," the articles continues, "the friend simply couldn't believe that Te'o would be stupid enough – or Ronaiah Tuiasosopo clever enough – to sustain the relationship for nearly a year."

Quote from: lustindarkness on January 17, 2013, 10:47:15 AM
And if he is a victim of a hoax, he is still a liar. He was ashamed to having a internet girlfriend and lied about her, embellished the story, still lying. Liar, not honest, not good, not good Christian...

Quote from: Strix on January 17, 2013, 09:54:12 AM
His punishment is coming. The rumor is the Bills will take him with the 8th pick!  :yuk:

Quote from: Ed Anger on January 17, 2013, 01:08:07 PM
Since it appears the main attackers of this kid are the lefty New York hipster faggits and angry women of gawker, I have thrown my entire support around Fergus McFakey.

Quote from: Valmy on January 17, 2013, 01:12:07 PM

Quote from: Ed Anger on January 17, 2013, 01:08:07 PM
Since it appears the main attackers of this kid are the lefty New York hipster faggits and angry women of gawker, I have thrown my entire support around Fergus McFakey.

I don't believe it.  Lefty New York hipster faggits don't care about sports.

Quote from: Ed Anger on January 17, 2013, 01:18:41 PM
Sports interfere with their hipster Trader Joe's bullshit.

Quote from: Ed Anger on January 17, 2013, 01:08:07 PM
Since it appears the main attackers of this kid are the lefty New York hipster faggits and angry women of gawker, I have thrown my entire support around Fergus McFakey.

Quote from: Valmy on January 17, 2013, 01:12:07 PM

Quote from: Ed Anger on January 17, 2013, 01:08:07 PM
Since it appears the main attackers of this kid are the lefty New York hipster faggits and angry women of gawker, I have thrown my entire support around Fergus McFakey.

I don't believe it.  Lefty New York hipster faggits don't care about sports.

Quote from: CountDeMoney on January 17, 2013, 01:19:27 PM

Quote from: Ed Anger on January 17, 2013, 01:18:41 PM
Sports interfere with their hipster Trader Joe's bullshit.

Passe'.  It's Whole Foods now.

Quote from: lustindarkness on January 17, 2013, 10:47:15 AM
And if he is a victim of a hoax, he is still a liar. He was ashamed to having a internet girlfriend and lied about her, embellished the story, still lying. Liar, not honest, not good, not good Christian...

Quote from: ulmont on January 17, 2013, 10:50:54 AM
(https://languish.org/forums/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi39.photobucket.com%2Falbums%2Fe189%2FRollTideTA%2Fteo.gif&hash=5d26998d8424bf46866e04c58f8560374fab1b3e)

Quote from: Berkut on January 17, 2013, 04:28:11 PM

Quote from: ulmont on January 17, 2013, 10:50:54 AM
(https://languish.org/forums/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fi39.photobucket.com%2Falbums%2Fe189%2FRollTideTA%2Fteo.gif&hash=5d26998d8424bf46866e04c58f8560374fab1b3e)

OK, that was honestly LOL worthy.

My wife doesn't get it though....

QuoteManti Te'o in his own words

We asked SI senior writer Pete Thamel to give an account of his reporting on the Manti Te'o story, which ran in the Oct. 1 issue and can be found here (http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vault/article/magazine/MAG1206734/index.htm?eref=sisf). The story was assigned after reports surfaced that Te'o's grandmother and girlfriend had died within six hours of each other on Sept. 12 and 13, and that Te'o, Notre Dame's star linebacker, was continuing to play.

On Sunday, Sept. 23, I sat down with Manti Te'o for a story that was due two hours after the interview concluded and would appear on SI's cover later that week. The detail he provided me about Lennay Kekua, who he said had died 10 days earlier -- six hours after his grandmother passed away -- was staggering. He said that they met through his cousin nearly four years ago and started "dating" on Oct. 15, 2011. Te'o told me she graduated from Stanford, lived in Carson, Calif., had family roots in Hawaii and helped take over part of her dad's job in the construction business, though her passion was to work with children and she'd traveled as far as New Zealand to do so. He said she got hit by a drunk driver on April 28, 2012, discovered that she had leukemia while recovering, and received her cancer treatment at St. Jude Medical Center in Fullerton, Calif. He never specified that he'd met her in person, and I didn't ask. Why would you ask someone if he'd actually met his girlfriend who recently died?

Last night I went through about six hours of interviews from the five days I spent at Notre Dame reporting the Te'o story. Father Paul Doyle, the rector of Dillon Hall, where Te'o lived for three years, told me, "I think I had met the girlfriend. I think she had been here visiting the year before." (He gave Te'o a prayer card that said the men of Dillon Hall were praying for his loss.) Coach Brian Kelly, defensive coordinator Bob Diaco and teammates such as Theo Riddick, Robby Toma and Cierre Wood described in painstaking detail Te'o's emotions on the day he got the call in the locker room that Kekua had died. I was told by teammates and coaches that Te'o had been on the phone with her while getting his ankles taped and for weeks after her death he stayed in close communication with her supposed family.

Before I went to campus, I had conducted lengthy interviews with Brian Te'o, Manti's dad, and Dalton Hilliard, a close friend from Punahou High in Honolulu who played at UCLA. Both said they were in frequent communication with Kekua; Brian Te'o told me he had received a condolence text from her after his mother died. They also spoke on the phone at length, as he did with Lennay's brothers after her "death." Hilliard said he received frequent texts and tweets from her.

"She was a very supportive, loving passionate individual," Hillard said. "She was all about God and prayer and being able to have faith. Me and her never met in person. But I felt like this was a testament to who she was. She would still text and tweet me before my games."

He added, "It was a pleasure for me to know her. The fact she made my best friend such a happy man, it's something that made me a happy man as well."

When I arrived in South Bend, Ind., that Wednesday morning, Te'o, his team and an entire campus talked openly about mourning Kekua. I had little reason to believe that she didn't exist.

But in retrospect there were some red flags. When I checked Lexis Nexis to find out more about Kekua, I couldn't find anything, though that's not uncommon for a college-aged student. Nor was there anything on her supposed twin brother, Koa. I was unable to track down any obituaries or funeral notices, but that might be explained by the fact that she had three recent places she called home, or by her family not wanting publicity.

I called Mike Eubanks at Stanford to check Kekua's graduation year. Te'o wasn't sure if it was 2010 or 2011. Eubanks is an assistant athletic director for football and he coordinates on-campus recruiting visits. He knew Te'o from Stanford recruiting him in 2008 and '09 -- Stanford had gone after him hard. Eubanks, who directed Stanford's football media relations this season, couldn't find her in the alumni directory and thought it was odd that, on such a small campus, he'd never heard of a student dating Te'o. This was the most glaring sign I missed. I thought that maybe she didn't graduate, so we took any reference to Stanford out of the story.

We searched for details about the car crash. Brian Te'o told our fact checker and Manti told me that a drunk driver had hit her. We couldn't find any articles about that accident and took the drunk driving reference out. It was just a car accident.

For the interview on Sunday afternoon Te'o and I sat in the linebacker meeting room in Notre Dame's football facility and he looked straight at me as he spoke. His eyes welled up at times. The only time he didn't speak with confidence was when I asked how they met. I didn't press him, as it was clearly something he didn't want to share. I suspected they may have met online, understood he wouldn't have wanted that public and moved on.

Here's what Te'o told me that day about his relationship with Kekua, and comments from others for the story:

TE'O: On April 28 [my girlfriend] got in a bad accident and was hit by a drunk driver. Ever since April 28 she's been in the hospital. She recovered from the accident but we were always wondering why some days she would be doing well and the next day she would be down in the dumps and complaining about pain in her back. It was then that we found out she had leukemia.
SI: Sorry to cut you off, just trying to get the timetable right.
TE'O: It was the beginning of July. She and I, man, we had this relationship where it was just amazing. With all that time on her hands in the hospital, she was never thinking about herself and what was hurting here. She was always thinking about others. She went on and wrote a letter to me before every game. Things that she would want me to know. So yeah.
SI: Did she send them to you?
TE'O: She had them all on her iPad and her family found [them]. Her family, what they would do is they would read it to me. And then they'll send it to me in a picture.
SI: You called them one day leading into each game?
TE'O: Yeah, I'll call and check up on them and see how they're doing, see how things are going. Just like I check in on my family at home.
SI: What day this week did they read you the letter?
TE'O: Friday. I checked in on Friday.
SI: How did you meet her?
TE'O: We met just, ummmm, just she knew my cousin. And kind of saw me there so. Just kind of regular.
SI: How long were you dating? I know that can be a complicated question.
TE'O: Oct. 15 was the official date. Of last year. I've known her for four years. So we've been friends.
SI: So you dated for about a year.
TE'O: Yeah.
SI: Just want to make sure I have her name right.
TE'O: Lennay Kekua.
SI: How do you want her to be remembered?
TE'O: Lennay was so special. Her relationship with the heavenly father was so strong. She's so humble, hard working. And her main thing was her family. Her family was everything to her. As long as she took care of her family. And as long as she knew that her relationship with our heavenly father was strong, she had faith that everyone would work out. With her it was just always loving God and her family. I was just blessed to be part of that.
SI: How old was she when she passed?
TE'O: She was 22.
SI: She has a Hawaiian sounding name. Is she from there?
TE'O: Her real name is actually Melelengei, but her friends couldn't say that so they just called her Lennay.
SI: What did she do?
TE'O: She actually just graduated from Stanford. She worked at Clark's Construction Company, I think. She replaced her dad after her dad passed.
SI: When did her dad pass?
TE'O: In October. She took that mantle for him.
SI: Does the family own a construction business?
TE'O: No. But they're part of the whole administration, the higher-ups. Their family worked really hard and worked their way up. She's very smart, very smart and very intellectual. She worked there but her main dream was to work with kids. She traveled all around. She taught at elementary schools. She flew to New Zealand to just work with kids. That's what she loved to do, work with children.
SI: What did she study?
TE'O: She graduated in 2011 or 2010. 2011.
SI: What was her major?
TE'O: Her major was in English and something. I'll double check.
SI: I can call Stanford and check. They have to have some record or note that she passed.
SI: So long distance relationship?
TE'O: She was supposed to come [to visit me at Notre Dame]. She was just cleared to come to the Wake Forest game, my senior game. It was mainly just on the phone, every day.
SI: Your dad told me that he called you at 7 a.m. on the day she died. He said when he woke up he had texts from Lennay. I'm confused. Walk me through that day.
TE'O: She was actually getting better to the point where she was cleared to fly and was sent home. She was doing better. So I woke up in the morning and my parents woke me up and they told me about my grandma. And my girlfriend was just someone who was so loving and caring and cares for others. She really loves my parents and my parents love her. She called and she offered her condolences on behalf of her and her family and she was telling them that she loves him and how they're thinking and praying for us.
And then I remember I went to class and went to workouts and after workouts, right before I was about to come into meetings, I got a text message from her phone but it was her brother. Every time her brother texts me he just says, "Bro." I was like, "Why is her brother texting me?" Then I get a phone call from her older brother's phone. He's just crying. And immediately I felt like, "Oh my Gosh, what just happened." And then he told me, "She's gone bro."
SI: How did it happen?
TE'O: It was just so sudden. I don't know the details of it. It was just a surprise.
SI: What was her older brother's name?
TE'O: Koa.
SI: What did he have to tell you?
TE'O: I kind of felt it. He was just crying and crying and crying. I just had to calm him down. I was like, "You have to speak clearly, I need to know what's going on." That's when he told me, Lala is gone. That's what they call her. They call her Lala.
SI: How did you feel in the locker room when you got the news?
TE'O: I just felt that it just turned black. Things got dark. I have never felt that way before. And I don't know. I couldn't control anything. I was just, pure, just I don't even know the feeling. I can't even describe it. I just broke down.
SI: Why did you go to practice after you found out the news?
TE'O: I knew for me that my girlfriend and my family would want me to be out there. They wouldn't want me to be sulking over things. I knew for me, the best way to show them that I loved them was to play the best game of my life on Saturday. In order to do that, I needed to be out there practicing no matter what I was going through. I needed to just suck it up and get out there and get my work done and be ready to represent them the best way I know how on Saturday. When I got out there, it was hard. But I just brought my team up. Coach brought my team up. He had them come out and explain to them what happened. I told them I love each and every one of you. I lost my grandmother the night before and found out this morning that I just lost my girlfriend six hours later. Never in my life has family been pushed to the forefront. My goal is now, and has been, but there's more to it now. Just to make sure I see my family and loved ones again. I told them, this is my family. You guys are my family. I love each and every one of you. Stick together. And I told them, my girlfriend always told me, "Send roses while they still can smell them, tell them they love you (sic) while they still can hear it." I told them to make sure you tell your family members you love them every single day.
SI: You have a wedding ring on?
TE'O: It's my church ring. I wear it to remember her. To remember my girlfriend.
SI: Did she give it to you?
TE'O: It's a CTR ring. It stands for choose the right. I always wore it. I had to switch it from my right to my left.
SI: What is it made of?
TE'O: Steel. Some sort of steel.
SI: Coach Kelly said he was more worried about you this week than last week?
TE'O: It was harder than it was the previous week. I was rolling. The feeling of it settling in that, she's not physically here no more. You just can't call her. I talked to my girlfriend every single day. I slept on the phone with her every single day. When she was going though chemo, she would have all these pains and the doctors were saying they were trying to give her medicine to make her sleep. She still couldn't sleep. She would say, "Just call my boyfriend and have him on the phone with me, and I can sleep." I slept on the phone with her every single night.
SI: You would literally sleep with your phone on with her on it?
TE'O: With her on it.
SI: When you woke up?
TE'O: She's be on it.
SI: What would the phone say?
TE'O: Like eight hours. Lucky she had AT&T so it was all free or my family would kill me.
SI: When did you start talking to her all night?
TE'O: When she got in her accident?
SI: So starting in April?
TE'O: Yeah and you know, she was in a coma. I would try, and you know.
SI: Hit by a drunk driver. What were her injuries?
TE'O: I don't know. She had a lot of different injuries.
SI: How long was she hospitalized?
TE'O: She was in that hospital for about two months.
SI: Wow, did she get out?
TE'O: She didn't get out. She went from there. Remember she got in the accident and she was in a coma. We lost her, actually, twice. She flatlined twice. They revived her twice. It was just a trippy situation. It was a day I was flying home from South Bend to go home for summer break. It was May. Mid-May. That was the day where they said, "Bro, we're going to pull it. We're going to pull the plug." I remember having this feeling like everything is going to be OK. They were telling me, "Say your goodbyes." From April 28 to around mid-May, I was always talking to my girlfriend who was on a machine.
SI: She couldn't communicate?
TE'O: No. She could only breathe. One of the miraculous things was when I talked to her and she would hear my voice her breathing would pick up. Like quickly, and then she would start crying. But her breathing would quicken, and she would start crying. So her brother was in the room with the nurse. They were monitoring her. She said, "Who is she on the phone with?" Her boyfriend. She was like, "That's amazing. She doesn't do that with anybody else." So that happened. And then she flatlined and we were losing her.
The day I went home, that was the day they were going to pull it. They were saying their goodbyes and all that. I said, "Babe, I'm never going to say goodbye to you. If you really want to go, she really missed her dad, so I said, "If you want to go, be with dad, go. Just know that I love you very, very much." I had this very positive feeling that everything was going to be OK. I landed in Hawaii. By the time I said my goodbyes. Not my goodbyes, my I love you, I'll see you later, that kind of thing, I jumped on the airplane to go to Hawaii. They were scheduled to pull the plug while I was in the air.
So right when I landed, I was expecting to get a voicemail saying she's gone. So I landed and I had a voicemail from her brother saying, "Brother, call me back right now." So you can imagine what's going through my head. I was like, "What am I going to do? How am I going to take this?'"And so I called him back, the doctor came in and he saw something and he wants to try some treatment on her to see if it works. From there she slowly started to get better. Slowly. Eventually she came out of her coma and she started having memory problems and she couldn't remember because of the accident. That's how much damage she had to her frontal lobe. She had memory problems. I was actually the first person that she talked to. She was breathing, breathing. When I talked to her, I would say, "Babe, do you know who this is?" I knew she knew who it was because her breathing would pick up. I was like, "Relax, chill. Breathe slowly. Breathe slowly." And then, that was when she first started to speak was that conversation. I was like, "Babe, I love you. I love you." Very slightly she said, "I love you."

QuoteSI: Was that right when you got back?
TE'O: Then she started to make progress.
SI: This is unbelievable.
TE'O: As she started to make progress. She had her good days. And then the next day she'd say, "Babe my back is sore. I can't feel it. Something is wrong. I don't know what's wrong. My chest is burning." And stuff like that. They said that they took her in and ran some blood tests and that's when they found leukemia. From that hospital she was treated for cancer and then she went to St. Jude's. She was in St. Jude's and then she went to another hospital.
SI: Your girlfriend's funeral was yesterday?
TE'O: I talked to [her family yesterday]. I cried. I cried at 12 noon yesterday. At 9 a.m. California time.
SI: She was buried in California?
TE'O: She was always in California. Her family is from Hawaii but they live in California.
SI: Where did you meet her in California?
TE'O: She actually came to one of the games. She saw me at one of the games.
SI: October 15, I assume is USC?
TE'O: That was in November. But she saw me at the USC game of my sophomore year. We were still just friends, we were acquaintances.
SI: Where did she live then?
TE'O: Carson.
SI: The funeral service was in Carson? At 9 a.m., a closed casket?
TE'O: Yes. The family was telling me, what the plans were and at 9 they closed the casket and stuff like that.
SI: Where were you at noon yesterday?
TE'O: It was kind of actually perfect timing. I was getting my reps and in my mind I said, "What time is it? What time is it?" It was perfect timing. Right when coach was like,"All right, second group get it," I turned to him and was like, "Coach what time is it?" He said, "It's 12:01." As I walked back to the (inaudible) I just cried.
SI: I just want to make sure. Lennay had an iPad. She wrote a series of 12 letters to you every Friday before a game. Who read these to you?
TE'O: Her brother or her sister. Noa is her twin brother.
SI: How long was each letter?
TE'O: It was about a page.
SI: That will be one of the things you look forward to.
TE'O: Her words run through my head. One of the words in her letter was, "Babe, after every quarter, instead of looking around, close your eyes and thank the Heavenly Father for another quarter and focus yourself. Just focus on the here and now."
Editor's note: On Nov. 30, Thamel did a follow-up interview with Te'o for SI Present's bowl issue. He reiterated the story about the iPad letters and how one of the siblings would read the letter of the week out loud to them. The supposed family went through enough painstaking detail to say that her brother spelled his name Noa.
TE'O: "The last letter I received was after the Stanford game and she wrote one more for the senior game. They (one of the siblings) would read it for me before the game and send it to me so I can read it."

TEAMMATE CIERRE WOOD

SI: So Manti stood up in front of the team?
WOOD: He stood up in front of the team and told us what happened. It was on the field. He told us, "I love you guys." We got his back. We always had his back, we've always had his back since he came in. And that's not going to change.
SI: You guys are there for him. How?
WOOD: I mean, everyone was texting and calling him. I'm pretty sure he didn't want a lot of people at his condo. If I come out my door and turn right I'm at his door. I was over there sitting with him and talking to him, telling him everything would be OK. I couldn't imagine if anything like that happened to my girl. It was really, really tough on him. He had all his brothers there to keep his head up and keep him focused.
SI: Tell me about the scene.
WOOD: The whole time, I'm just sitting there asking, "Would I be able to do it?" I don't think I would have, knowing how much I love my girl. I would be so distraught about it. I would be so down in the dumps I wouldn't know what to do. He held himself together and we gave him all the time that he needed to get out what he wanted to say, what he needed to say. He left it like that. It was all in the circle. I don't know how long it was.

DALTON HILLIARD, A HIGH SCHOOL TEAMMATE WHO PLAYED AT UCLA

SI: Tell me about Lennay.
HILLIARD: She was a very supportive, loving passionate individual. She was all about God and prayer and being able to have faith. Me and her never met in person. But I felt like this was a testament to who she was. She would still text and tweet me before my games. Good luck brother. Good job out there today.
The fact that she would do that for someone she never met. The fact that [Manti] and I are such great friends and brothers. Who she was and is as a person. Pleasure for me to know her. She made my best friend such a happy man, it's something that made me a happy man as well.

FATHER PAUL DOYLE, RECTOR OF MANTI'S DORM, DILLON HALL

I was surprised to hear about it on the news. No one had called me, and I'm the team chaplain for God's sakes. It was a surprise to me. You don't have to put that in the article. I was at practice two days last week. They typically practice 20 to 24 periods a day. I stay for five and stand there and watch. Last few weeks I have stood on the defensive field.
He acknowledged me. I don't want to be a distraction. He waved to me and he did last week. I had no idea what he was carrying with him at the time.
I had the other chaplain. He didn't know about it either. He said I'm watching the same thing. To lose those two people. I think I had met the girlfriend. I think she had been here visiting the year before. He might have even asked me to pray for a health condition that she had. That sounds vaguely familiar, but I know she was a beautiful person. I had no idea it was life threatening. And then she's gone.
We prayed for them Sunday night by name, as we do anyone that loses a close relative. Of course Manti wasn't there. I'm going to give him a card saying the men of Dillon Hall are praying for Mrs. Santiago and for Lennay.

MARK THESING, TEAM CHAPLIN FOR ROAD GAMES

I checked with (Jack Klunder), Director of Football Operations and we spoke back and forth. Thursday night. Friday. We made special mention of that during the mass. Unfortunately, I've been with the team a number of times with deaths. As a matter of fact, there's been three other incidents.
Anytime at Notre Dame, we bring that to faith, we bring that to prayer. I think it was important to Manti and to his teammates and being there and recognizing that this is something that we have a higher power for to deal with these issues.

BOB DIACO, NOTRE DAME DEFENSIVE COORDINATOR

I was basically with him when he got the call about his girlfriend. He was distraught, as you would imagine. And an hour later he was at practice distraught. But you know, he compartmentalized what he needed to. He wasn't focused on himself. He was focused on himself and was focused on what those people would want him to do in that moment and he was focused on his teammates and in general.
"Everyone that I love here is over there. I'm going to be with them." That's what he said to the team. Basically, he explained the tragedy that happened and explained that why he was here and why he was important that he was with them.
Everyone loves Manti. Whatever he needs. Everyone is all in. It's the culture of this team. Everyone is all in.

BRIAN KELLY, NOTRE DAME HEAD COACH

Like no circumstances that I can remember in 22 years that a young man has been hit with incredible news just before practice. And when I find out about it, and I come out of the meeting room, there's 10 players around him, sitting with him. Supporting him. I asked all the players to go back to their meetings and I sat with him and Robby Toma, his close friend. We spent a little time and I brought him up here to my office. Take your time to talk to your family in here by yourself. He did that for about an hour. I came back in and told him to take the day and hang in here and take a nap.
I need to be around the people I want to be around. I need to be at practice. If that's how you feel, you need to talk to the team and tell them why you're out here. You need to tell them why you're here. We stretched and broke them down and brought them together and Manti told the team why he was out there and how important all of them were.

Quote from: sbr on January 17, 2013, 06:57:06 PM
This kid is either the dumbest, most immature, gullible person on the face of this earth or he was in on this thing in some way.

Quote from: crazy canuck on January 17, 2013, 01:25:03 PM
What a sad story.  First his girlfriend has a serious car accident then she goes back in time and dumps him.

Gotta feel for the guy.

Quote from: Barrister on January 17, 2013, 10:40:50 AM

Quote from: merithyn on January 17, 2013, 10:33:30 AM

Quote from: Barrister on January 17, 2013, 10:22:48 AM
Is this going to come back to bite Notre Dame?  Now it comes out they knew about this story for weeks but didn't say anything.

Why would it? :huh:

He was the victim of a hoax. The media jumped on the story - which was very real to Te'O - and peddled him as this American hero. What, exactly, did Notre Dame or Te-O do wrong that would somehow harm either of them?

Well the jury is still out on whether Te'O was a victim or not.  The Deadspin article believed he was in on it.

But the 'dead girlfriend' was a story repeated many times to the national media.  Once they learned this story was false surely ND had a duty to tell the truth?

Quote from: sbr on January 17, 2013, 06:57:06 PM
This kid is either the dumbest, most immature, gullible person on the face of this earth or he was in on this thing in some way.

QuoteNot once but twice after he supposedly discovered his online girlfriend of three years never even existed, Notre Dame All-American linebacker Manti Te'o perpetuated the heartbreaking story about her death.
An Associated Press review of news coverage found that the Heisman Trophy runner-up talked about his doomed love in a Web interview on Dec. 8 and again in a newspaper interview published Dec. 11. He and the university said Wednesday that he learned on Dec. 6 that it was all a hoax, that not only wasn't she dead, she wasn't real....

QuoteLate Thursday evening, an independent baseball team, the Florence (Ky.) Freedom, announced it would have "Manti Te'o Girlfriend Bobblehead Day."

As part of the promotion in late May, the first 1,000 fans will get an empty bobblehead box, there will be a pretend kiss cam for fans to kiss their imaginary friends and there will be an imaginary food fight in the kids' area, as well as an air guitar contest.

Quote from: 11B4V on January 18, 2013, 02:05:57 AM
Hmm, not a good candidate for assault weapon ownership.

Quote from: CountDeMoney on January 18, 2013, 08:24:53 AM

QuoteLate Thursday evening, an independent baseball team, the Florence (Ky.) Freedom, announced it would have "Manti Te'o Girlfriend Bobblehead Day."

As part of the promotion in late May, the first 1,000 fans will get an empty bobblehead box, there will be a pretend kiss cam for fans to kiss their imaginary friends and there will be an imaginary food fight in the kids' area, as well as an air guitar contest.

Quote from: CountDeMoney on January 18, 2013, 08:24:53 AM

QuoteLate Thursday evening, an independent baseball team, the Florence (Ky.) Freedom, announced it would have "Manti Te'o Girlfriend Bobblehead Day."

As part of the promotion in late May, the first 1,000 fans will get an empty bobblehead box, there will be a pretend kiss cam for fans to kiss their imaginary friends and there will be an imaginary food fight in the kids' area, as well as an air guitar contest.

Quote from: katmai on January 19, 2013, 08:20:58 PM
Why is Timmay stooping to Marti like levels of trying to see homosexuality in everything?

Quote from: PDH on January 19, 2013, 08:26:43 PM
As a first hand expert in dumb, you should have recognized a kindred spirit right away.

Quote from: derspiess on February 26, 2013, 10:31:20 AM
I was going to take a couple days off and go to the combine but it would have essentially meant taking time off from my real job to go drive 4 hours to Indy to work essentially for free.  I wouldn't get to just sit around & watch. 

I missed out on some awesome dinners/drinks on someone else's tab, though.

Quote from: Ed Anger on February 26, 2013, 09:26:56 AM
He's Vernon Gholston part deux.

Quote from: CountDeMoney on February 26, 2013, 02:09:53 PM
For those of you that haven't seen it, Teo's 40 yard dash with John Harbaugh on a split screen says it all.

http://bleacherreport.com/articles/1543795-john-harbaugh-not-impressed-with-manti-teos-unimpressive-40-yard-dash

Quote from: Neil on February 26, 2013, 11:29:04 AM

Quote from: derspiess on February 26, 2013, 10:31:20 AM
I was going to take a couple days off and go to the combine but it would have essentially meant taking time off from my real job to go drive 4 hours to Indy to work essentially for free.  I wouldn't get to just sit around & watch. 

I missed out on some awesome dinners/drinks on someone else's tab, though.

I'm sure, given the legendary cheapness of the Brown family, that meals for the Bengals contingent were catered by White Castle.

Quote from: Valmy on February 26, 2013, 03:35:59 PM

Quote from: CountDeMoney on February 26, 2013, 02:09:53 PM
For those of you that haven't seen it, Teo's 40 yard dash with John Harbaugh on a split screen says it all.

http://bleacherreport.com/articles/1543795-john-harbaugh-not-impressed-with-manti-teos-unimpressive-40-yard-dash

LOL

I guess Teo is not the next Ray Lewis.

Quote from: CountDeMoney on February 26, 2013, 02:09:53 PM

Quote from: Ed Anger on February 26, 2013, 09:26:56 AM
He's Vernon Gholston part deux.

Actually, I see him more of a Dat Nguygen;  undersized, but a solid contributor in the right system.  Wouldn't take him with a 1st or even 2nd pick, though.

For those of you that haven't seen it, Teo's 40 yard dash with John Harbaugh on a split screen says it all.

http://bleacherreport.com/articles/1543795-john-harbaugh-not-impressed-with-manti-teos-unimpressive-40-yard-dash