The death threats, Mary Willingham expected.

More shocking is that the University of North Carolina is now disavowing her research as a whistle-blower — research that showed between 8% and 10% of the school’s football and basketball players are reading below a third-grade level.

UNC issued a statement Wednesday night saying it did not believe Willingham’s account of a basketball player who could not read or write…

And purported e-mail exchanges obtained by CNN since August show that Willingham did share her findings at least twice — once with Executive Vice Provost James W. Dean Jr., and once with a member of a university committee on academics and athletics.