A group of racists waving Confederate flags, revving their truck engines and shouting profanities allegedly victimized the University of Utah women’s basketball team Thursday while in Coeur d’Alene for the NCAA tournament held in Spokane.
“For our players and staff to not feel safe in an NCAA tournament environment is a waste,” Utah head coach Lynne Roberts said.
The incident led to the team remaining in Spokane for the remainder of its schedule.
“We’re getting to the point where people of color can’t even travel anywhere,” said Lisa Gardner, president of the Spokane NAACP. “It’s starting to remind me of the ’60s.”
The latest example of public hatred aimed at North Idaho, the episode prompted some to question why the team was tasked with staying there in the first place.
“We shouldn’t have been there,” Utah athletic director Mark Harlan told KSL.com. “I appreciate the NCAA and Gonzaga getting us out of this situation, but we should never have been there in the first place. So a lot of people need to go home and heal from this whole thing.
Roberts addressed the situation in a news conference following the team’s loss Monday to first- and second-round tournament host Gonzaga.
On Thursday, the Utah team and another women’s team staying at the Coeur d’Alene Resort were walking to dinner at a restaurant on Sherman Avenue when the driver of a truck flying a Confederate flag began shouting the word N and other racist insults against members. basketball teams, cheerleaders, band and other members of the traveling group.
As the team left the restaurant to return to their hotel, the truck driver was joined by “reinforcements of other racists,” according to the Kootenai County Human Relations Task Force. They followed the women to the complex, spouting more hate speech and revving the engines of their trucks, threatening the players.
“You know, you think in our world of sports and academia, it’s shocking,” Roberts said in a news conference Monday night after his team’s loss to Gonzaga. “There’s so much diversity on a college campus that you’re not often exposed to it. And so when you are, it’s like – you know, there are people who say, “Man, I can’t believe this happened.” But you know, racism is real. It happens. It’s horrible.
“So for our players, whether they’re white, black, green, whatever, no one knew how to handle that. It was really upsetting.
The episode led Utah athletic officials to call police at 9:57 p.m.
The caller, identified in a police report as a donor to the Utah team, reported to police what happened four hours earlier, around 6 p.m.
The caller told police the crew drove to Crafted Tap House, 523 Sherman Ave., when two “lifted pickups” “revved their engines and accelerated alongside the crew as ‘They were marching into Sherman.’
“The trucks then turned around and came back toward the team and yelled the ‘N’ word at them because many of their players are African-American,” the Coeur d’Alene police report states. The caller “stated that the incident caused well-founded fear among the players.”
Police were unable to track down the people who harassed the players, Coeur d’Alene Police Chief Lee White said. He said the FBI had been called for help since federal laws, such as malicious harassment and disturbing the peace, may have been violated.
Detectives are looking for video from businesses or any of the approximately 100 people who were in the area at the time.
Gonzaga women’s basketball head coach Lisa Fortier said in a statement Tuesday that the incident made the visiting team’s experience “unforgettable for the wrong reason.”
“I am deeply saddened to learn of the horrific racial hatred directed toward the student-athletes, coaches and staff who were in Coeur d’Alene. As a student-athlete and coach, your goal is to make the NCAA Tournament, and it should be an unforgettable experience. In this case, it is unforgettable for the wrong reason and that is why I hurt those who were subjected to such despicable hatred,” Fortier said in the statement.
Spokane hotels were booked in the middle of major events that happened the same weekend.
The city, as it has for years, hosted the Pacific Northwest Qualifier volleyball tournament and its 800 teams, said Keytra Lewis, Spokane’s director of sports communications. The NCAA needs hotels where teams can stay. The Coeur d’Alene Resort – considered perhaps the area’s first hotel – is what the NCAA “approved” for the women’s team, which was decided at the last minute due to the outcome of the tournament, Lewis said.
Bill Regan, manager of the Coeur d’Alene Resort, called the harassment terrible during Tuesday’s news conference.
“These students had the right to walk downtown without being harassed. Don’t let the actions of a few indict all of Coeur d’Alene,” he said.
Spokane also hosted the first and second rounds of men’s basketball in the NCAA tournament, awarded to the city several years ago.
The visiting UC Irvine team, which also stayed in Coeur d’Alene, did not witness similar behavior but requested to relocate “for the well-being and safety of our students- athletes and the whole travel part,” said Mike Uhlenkamp, spokesperson. for UC Irvine.
The South Dakota State University team remained in Post Falls and had no problems, spokesman Mike Lockrem said.
Charmelle Green, who is black and Utah’s assistant athletic director, told KSL.com that after the team returned to their Coeur d’Alene hotel Thursday night, she started crying.
“I will never forget the noise that I heard, the intimidation of the noise coming from that engine and the (N-word),” she said. “I go to bed and hear it every night since I’ve been here.”
Gardner noted that the team’s athletes of color faced racist remarks just before one of the biggest games of their careers.
“It puts them in a bad situation before a game to know that they’re in racist territory, that they’re getting racist slurs before a very important game,” Gardner said. “It’s just unfortunate. I don’t know what to say outside, it’s absolutely disgusting.
In a statement, tournament organizer Gonzaga said: “Hate speech, in any form, is disgusting, shameful and must never be tolerated. We have worked hard to secure the opportunity to serve as the host institution, and our first priority is and must be the safety and well-being of all student-athletes, coaches, families and support staff. … We are frustrated and deeply saddened to know that what should always be an incredible experience for visitors and the championship has been compromised in any way by this situation, as it in no way reflects the values, standards and the beliefs to which we at Gonzaga University hold ourselves accountable. .”
At Crafted Taphouse, restaurant manager Junior Mujtaba said Tuesday he was happy to welcome the Utah team.
“I would say the team still looked cheerful and happy when they arrived, but I could tell something was up. There were a few going back and forth talking to Kendall, the head coordinator of everything… Talking to the coaches, and I could see something was happening,” Mujtaba said. “I was a little worried, wondering, thinking it could have been us. But they ended up relaxing, calming down and having a good time.
The restaurant does not have exterior security cameras. But an interior camera captured the team walking through the front door.
Coeur d’Alene is full of tourists and that doesn’t look good for the city, Mujtaba said.
“The fact that this happened is embarrassing. They were talking about coming back,” he said. “I was disappointed to hear they left.”
The Human Rights Task Force’s statement said: “This is once again a stain on our community that we have worked so hard to erase since the earliest days of the Aryan Nations.
“We are witnessing the worrying growth of a very toxic environment, both nationally and locally, by individuals and organized extremist groups who promote many forms of hatred by calling others traitors, communists, vermin, suggesting as well as some individuals are not human.
“These words and actions are creating serious divisions among people. We must denounce this destructive trend.
Dave Reilly, a self-described Christian nationalist and alt-right provocateur, interrupted the press conference and claimed he was a member of the media. He brought his child to the event and asked a question unrelated to racial harassment, leading to tense exchanges between the speakers and Reilly. The lecture was quickly interrupted as people in the crowd booed him.
Reilly is known for his promotion of the 2017 Unite the Right Charlottesville rally that turned deadly. Most recently, he was hired as a consultant to the Idaho Freedom Foundation until a leadership shakeup earlier this year.
Coeur d’Alene Mayor Jim Hammond apologized on behalf of the city to athletes in neighboring Utah.
“To the young women who suffered racist insults during their visit, I offer my most sincere apologies,” he said. “We are all on your side. We kiss you. We celebrate your achievements and strongly denounce any malicious treatment of you.
– With additional reporting from Thomas Clouse, Nick Gibson, John Stucke and Alayna Shulman
