Two Notre Dame seniors were assaulted while walking to an apartment in Lafayette Square early Saturday morning, police said.
The students, Chris Williams and Mark Koegel, said they were walking along Notre Dame Ave. near Club 23 toward Lafayette apartment complex on N. Frances St. when they were attacked.
Williams, a resident of Lafayette, said, he, Koegel and two other students walked past a house near Club 23 that had between eight and nine people they did not know on the porch at at about 1:30 a.m.
One of the people on the porch, who was described by Williams as a male between 18 and 19 years old, began a conversation with him.
Williams told The Observer he spoke with the man because he was "just trying to be friendly." Their conversation revolved around weekend plans, and the man asked Williams if he was going to the football game, he said.
In the middle of the conversation, the man "sucker-punched" Williams in the eye without provocation, Williams said.
He said that the assaulter, after learning that he and his friends were students at Notre Dame, threatened them and warned the group to "run away."
Koegel, who was walking behind Williams with another student, said he saw Williams get punched in the face and began to quicken his pace.
Another assailant "came out of nowhere" and hit him in the upper arm with a baseball bat, he said.
The group of students ran away from the scene, and the assailants did not follow them, Williams and Koegel, a Zahm resident, said.
When they arrived at Lafayette Square, Williams called the South Bend Police Department (SBPD).
SBPD was able to confirm the students' story with The Observer from the dispatch report from that morning.
The dispatch report said police were called at 2:31 a.m. Saturday morning to Lafayette Square where two males reported they had been assaulted while walking to the apartment complex.
The two refused ambulance treatment, SBPD said.
Koegel and Williams said they told the police they would not be able to identify their assailants, whom Koegel described as black men in their mid-20s.
When Koegel returned to campus, he went to Health Services at around 3 a.m., he said, to have his injured arm examined.
"They said I got hit in the best place that I could have gotten hit," he said.
After an examination, his arm was put in a sling but was not broken.
Neither student was seriously injured in the attack.
