The University of Minnesota football team on Saturday rescinded its threatened boycott of a bowl game, a protest that had been intended to persuade the administration to lift the suspensions of 10 players entangled in a sexual assault inquiry. Team leaders continued to say that the 10 players, whose suspensions remain in effect, were being punished without the benefit of due process.

Minnesota will meet Washington State in the Holiday Bowl on Dec. 27 in San Diego, avoiding what would have been the first time a top-tier college football team had missed a game because of a player protest in at least decades.

Team leaders gathered Saturday morning at a hastily arranged news conference in a team meeting room in the Bierman Field Athletic Building on campus to announce the decision, which came after a lengthy meeting on Friday night of team leaders with the university’s president, Eric W. Kaler, and Athletic Director Mark Coyle.

Wide receiver Drew Wolitarsky, a senior, read a statement from the team, saying, “After many hours of discussion within our team, and after speaking with President Kaler, it became clear that our original request of having the 10 suspensions overturned was not going to happen.”