Scandal alert! The heartbreaking story of Notre Dame’s Manti Te’o and his fight through tragic deaths of his grandmother and girlfriend in the same year touched a nation. Today, Deadspin is saying it might not be so true after all.

Lennay Kekua, the former girlfriend of Manti Te’o, was allegedly seriously injured in a car accident, then diagnosed with Leukemia. According to Te’o, she later died from her condition.

According to Deadspin, there was never a student at Stanford named Lennay Kekua. Nor were there any reports of a car accident involving that same name in California. Deadspin did confirm the death of his grandmother, but they were not able to find any facts about Lennay Kekua.

Notre Dame just released this statement:

"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."

But that doesn’t quite add up since Manti’s father went on record saying his son visited the girl in Hawaii. Hmmm...

Was this a move to win a Heisman?

For the entire story and logic, check out Deadspin’s take on Kekua here.

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