Ex-SJSU Coach Alleges in Federal Suit That Transgender Player Failed 2023 Testosterone Test

Melissa Batie-Smoose, a former assistant coach on San José State University's women's volleyball team, says a school administrator told her during the 2023 season that a transgender teammate had failed a testosterone test. The school has not confirmed it.

Batie-Smoose, now head volleyball coach at Cisco College, made the claim in an interview with OutKick. It also appears in her Oct. 13 federal lawsuit against the California State University trustees and 11 SJSU employees.

What the coach alleges

Batie-Smoose says associate athletics director Laura Alexander told her player Blaire Fleming had not yet shown up for a required blood test. Fleming had one day left before the team left for its first conference match, she says.

"And then, then she proceeded to tell me the next day that after the test, that the testosterone levels were too high, and Fleming is ineligible to play and will not be going on the trip that day," Batie-Smoose said.

She also says the result was kept "a secret" from the rest of the team.

Fleming then missed a long stretch of the season. A November 2023 game recap on SJSU's athletics website said the player had not competed since Sept. 16 of that year "due to injuries."

"The injury happened the day that Fleming went to go get tested, and it was very questionable," Batie-Smoose said.

The lawsuit says Fleming missed conference matches because of a reported hand injury, which the plaintiff "believes was an excuse to hide his ineligibility to play because of his hormone level." The suit frames that conclusion as her belief, not a documented fact.

What the records show

SJSU's game records confirm Fleming missed matches. They do not show whether a testosterone result had anything to do with it.

No test result has been made public. Neither SJSU nor CSU has confirmed or denied that a test took place. SJSU referred questions about the lawsuit to the CSU system, and CSU declined to comment.

The rules at the time

In 2023, NCAA rules allowed transgender women to compete on women's teams under a framework known as Phase Two, which stayed in place through the 2023-24 school year.

The policy required at least one year of testosterone suppression treatment before competing. Athletes also had to submit blood tests meeting the NCAA limit for their sport. For women's volleyball, that limit was below 10 nanomoles per liter of total testosterone.

That means a failed test, if one happened, would have carried real eligibility consequences under the NCAA's own policy.

The broader lawsuit

The testosterone claim is one piece of a larger complaint. Batie-Smoose alleges her removal amounted to sex discrimination and violated the First and Fourteenth Amendments. The case is Batie-Smoose v. The Board of Trustees of the California State University.

She describes a sincere Christian belief "that God created human beings male and female." She says she learned of the player's status shortly after starting at SJSU in 2023. She alleges head coach Todd Kress confirmed it, told her not to tell players, recruits, families or staff, and said she would be fired if she did.

Batie-Smoose says she told Kress she "could not in good conscience treat a male athlete as female." She alleges after April 2024 news articles publicized the player's status, SJSU assigned its assistant athletic director for diversity, equity and inclusion to "monitor" her. She says no other coach got that treatment.

She also alleges Kress mocked her in front of players as a "Trump lover," ridiculed her religious beliefs and once cornered and yelled at her. Those are her allegations. Kress has not responded in anything cited here.

She filed a Title IX complaint in the fall of 2024 and was then placed on administrative leave. SJSU notified her that her position would not be renewed while the investigation was pending, and it declined to renew her in 2025.

Where the case stands

Batie-Smoose first sued in September 2025 in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California. A federal judge later granted the defendants' motion to move the case to the Northern District. She filed the renewed suit on Oct. 13.

The federal government has already taken a position on SJSU. In January, the Trump administration concluded the university violated Title IX by letting a transgender athlete play on the women's volleyball team.

Two months later, SJSU President Cynthia Teniente-Matson announced that the school and the CSU system were suing the federal government to challenge the Education Department's determination. SJSU is contesting that finding in court.

The school's position on Batie-Smoose's specific claims will come through its legal response in the Northern District. It remains unclear whether any testing records exist from the fall of 2023, and whether they match what she says Alexander told her.