For the Outrage Industrial Complex, Rachel Richardson’s story had it all.

An earnest young athlete, the only Black starter on the Duke University volleyball team, Ms. Richardson claimed she was subjected to vile, racist taunts during a match at Brigham Young University in Utah, which features an overwhelmingly white enrollment. The young woman further claimed that she and her teammates reported the incident at the time but that officials ignored her. 

So, as one does, Ms. Richardson took to Twitter to voice her frustration about what allegedly transpired during the match between Duke and BYU at Provo on August 26.

“Friday night in our match against Brigham Young University my fellow African American teammates and I were targeted and racially heckled throughout the entirety of the match,” Ms. Richardson wrote. “The slurs and comments grew into threats which caused us to feel unsafe. Both the officials and BYU coaching staff were made aware of the incident during the game, but failed to take the necessary steps to stop the unacceptable behavior and create a safe environment.”

The outrage was instantaneous. Celebrities took to social media to express disgust. Several employees of ESPN tweeted angry missives. LeBron James said he “had her back.” Even Utah’s Republican governor, Spencer Cox, weighed in.

“Just catching up on this terrible story,” he posted on Twitter. “I’m disgusted that this behavior is happening and deeply saddened if others didn’t step up to stop it. As a society we have to do more to create an atmosphere where racist a**holes like this never feel comfortable attacking others.”

National newspapers and networks reported the incident as fact. A local paper did a deep dive into the history of race relations at BYU and regarding its owners, the Church of Latter Day Saints. One outlet, Axios, wrote an entire article about the fact that the church’s education commissioner “rejected ‘the world’s’ diversity training” in the weeks before the match.

The University of South Carolina women’s basketball coach canceled a scheduled match with BYU’s team because she didn’t want to “put her players in that situation,” and dozens of other collegiate volleyball programs across the country announced that they would be wearing black to “BlackOutRacism” and “StandWithRachelRichardson.” Duke’s other sports teams started wearing gear emblazoned with the words, “Hate Won’t Live Here.”

Duke University’s president was outraged. BYU’s women’s volleyball coach apologized, and the school’s athletic director, Tom Holmoe, appeared at a game the following night to address the crowd.

“At last night’s game, there was some egregious and hurtful slurs that were directed at members of the Duke University women’s volleyball team,” Mr. Holmeo said. “As children of God, we are responsible, it’s our mission to love one another and treat everybody with respect, and that didn’t happen.”

BYU announced that it was removing the section set aside for student spectators from future matches, and permanently banned the young man Ms. Richardson accused of taunting her from BYU athletics events.

That there were problems with the story — problems that became evident almost immediately after the alleged incident — made no difference. The die had been cast.

Police reviewed multiple videos of the match and saw no evidence that the man singled out by Ms. Richardson and her teammates ever shouted anything. In fact, they said, he wasn’t even sitting in the student section during part of the match, and appeared to be playing with his phone during another part when Ms. Richardson was serving. In interviews with police, the man — identified only as a student at nearby Utah Valley University — categorically denied using any racial slurs.

The Salt Lake Tribune reported that since the match, both police and school officials have pleaded with the more than 5,500 attendees of the match to come forward and report about the incident. No one has stepped up to say they heard the man uttering the racial slurs. No one has reported even hearing any racial slurs. A policeman posted near the student section during the match said he heard nothing.

Nearly two weeks later, the story is still circulating. In a report Wednesday, the New York Times said the school is “still  investigating” the incident and — while briefly noting the lack of evidence — repeated Ms. Richardson’s version of events without reservation. The article also noted that less than 1 percent of BYU’s students are Black and that “students of color feel unsafe and isolated” on the campus.