A day after he was introduced as new Lakers head coach, representatives for JJ Redick issued a denial of allegations that he called a fellow Duke alum the N-word while in college.
Reps for Redick were responding to a tweet from author, speaker and self-described social impact pro Halleemah Nash that was sent Tuesday, in which Nash accused Redick of calling her the N-word when she was working with the Duke basketball team Redick played for in college:
I’ve only been called the N word to my face by a white man once in my life and it was on the campus of Duke University while I was doing work with the basketball team. And today he was named the new head coach of the Los Angeles Lakers. What a world.
— Halleemah Nash (@halleemah) June 25, 2024
Within a few hours, TMZ had gotten a denial of the story from Redick’s team:
We reached out to Redick’s camp for a response to the claim … and they completely shut it down.
“No, it never happened,” a spokesperson tells TMZ Sports.
The Lakers have not commented on the situation publicly as of publishing time.
However, while Redick’s reps denied Nash’s story, other disturbing moments from Redick’s past came to light in the wake of her social media post on Tuesday. They included 2014 allegations that Redick called an ex-girlfriend racial slurs in leaked emails related to an alleged abortion contract with the same woman; Redick denied the woman was ever pregnant in since-deleted tweets from 2013 calling the reports “outrageous, false and malicious.”
Additionally resurfacing on social media was an apology Redick issued in 2018 for appearing to accidentally use a racial slur in a Chinese New Year video from the NBA, as well as a bizarre story in which he claimed on his podcast to have potentially witnessed human trafficking before temporarily deleting his Twitter account.
We will update this story when and if more details/responses come to light.