Early this year Melinda Henneberger, a political writer for the Washington Post and lead writer on the Post’s She the People blog, approached NCR with a story.

Two years before, in 2010, Lizzy Seeberg, a 19-year-old freshman at Saint Mary’s College, situated across the street from the University of Notre Dame, committed suicide after accusing a Notre Dame football player of sexually assaulting her. Seeberg reported the incident to campus police, but they did not interview the student athlete in question for another 15 days — five days after her death.

Six months later the university held a closed-door disciplinary hearing at which the player testified. He was found “not responsible.” And he kept playing football.

On Jan. 7 this young man will be on the field as Notre Dame faces Alabama in the BCS National Championship game in Miami, and as a result, has generated renewed interest in the story NCR ran last March: Reported sexual assault at Notre Dame campus leaves more questions than answers [1]

A Notre Dame graduate from a family of Notre Dame graduates, Henneberger has been critical of her alma mater's handling of sex assault cases.

Henneberger wrote about the story again on the Washington Post website: Why I won’t be cheering for old Notre Dame [2], and she was on “Hardball with Chris Matthews” on MSNBC: Accountability in the World of Football [3]. The clip of that show is below. Sorry you have to watch an ad first.