Thank God we’re a two-newspaper town*

The Globe knows what we need, but the Herald knows what we want. In today’s Globe, Barbara Matson reports that Boston College women’s hockey coach Tom Mutch has resigned over “allegations of inappropriate conduct with a student-athlete.” Oh, yes. We get the picture.

Well, actually, we didn’t — at least, we didn’t until we turned to the Herald, which makes the Mutch resignation the subject of its front-page splash: “SEX SCANDAL ICES COACH.” Inside, we learn this, from reporter Laurel Sweet:

Hockey East Coach of the Year Tom Mutch, 39, who’s married and whose wife just had a baby, abruptly stepped down hours after the Herald began making inquiries to authorities at the Heights.

Sexually graphic text messages that BC hockey star [name omitted by Media Nation], 19, allegedly wrote to Mutch were discovered on a cell phone [she] gave to a teammate, neglecting to delete them first, sources said.

One source familiar with the messages described them as “filthy. They were very sexual in nature.”

And, oh yeah, there’s this: “Sources stressed that BC’s probe had yet to find an actual sexual relationship between Mutch and [the student].”

I’m under no illusions about protecting the 19-year-old student’s identity — I’m withholding it as a protest, and a rather futile one at that. I like reading about sex-related scandals as much as anyone, and the fact that BC officials are taking this so seriously means that Mutch is definitely fair game.

But to blast this on the front, and to identify the young woman at the center of this, seems way out of line, especially since all the facts are not yet in. Sweet deserves credit for breaking this story, but her editors blew it way out of proportion.

Update: The Heights, Boston College’s student newspaper, is reporting the student’s name as well. So I’ll concede that I may be alone on this one.

*With apologies, as always, to Boston Magazine, which used to have great fun with this feature.