Utah coach says her team had to switch hotels after racist attacks during NCAA Tournament

Utah coach says her team had to switch hotels after racist attacks during NCAA Tournament

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College of Utah’s girls’s basketball coach mentioned her staff was the goal of a sequence of “racial hate crimes” after arriving in Idaho for the NCAA Event final week. The incidents prompted the staff to vary accommodations for the sake of their security, she mentioned. 

Utah coach Lynne Roberts told reporters that the staff of Black, white and Latina athletes skilled a number of incidents Thursday night time after arriving within the Spokane space for the match the place they confronted Gonzaga College. Roberts didn’t go into element concerning the incidents, however mentioned they had been regarding sufficient to request that they be moved from their lodge in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, to a location nearer to Spokane. 

“Racism is actual and it occurs and it’s terrible,” Roberts advised reporters on Monday. “For our gamers, whether or not they’re white, Black, inexperienced, no matter — nobody knew easy methods to deal with it. And it was actually upsetting. And for our gamers and employees to not really feel protected in an NCAA match surroundings, it’s tousled.”

Roberts added that the NCAA and Gonzaga, the host college, labored to maneuver the staff to a unique lodge. Neither Roberts nor the ladies’s athletics division instantly responded to a request for remark.

The Utah Utes have a good time after a basket in opposition to South Dakota State on Saturday.Steph Chambers / Getty Photos

Utah’s deputy athletics director Charmelle Inexperienced, who’s Black, told Salt Lake City’s KSL News that the staff, together with band members and cheerleaders, had been strolling to a neighborhood restaurant for dinner when somebody in a white truck drove as much as the group, revved its engine, and yelled the N-word earlier than dashing away.

“All of us simply had been in shock, and we checked out one another like, did we simply hear that?” Inexperienced mentioned. “We saved strolling, simply shaking our heads, like, ‘I can’t imagine that.’”

The staff continued with the night. Then, as they had been leaving the restaurant, two vans got here close to them, the drivers revved their engines and yelled the N-word. 

“I received emotional and began to cry,” Inexperienced advised KSL. “I used to be simply numb all the night time.” 

The staff was staying in Idaho, about 35 minutes from Spokane, Washington, the place it was scheduled to play through the opening weekend of the match. Utah was one in every of three groups staying in Idaho as a substitute of Washington due to an absence of lodge house within the Spokane space, the place Gonzaga is situated. Utah’s athletic director Mark Harlan lamented the association, telling KSL, “We must always not have been there.” 


Utah head coach Lynne Roberts speaks Monday in Spokane.Younger Kwak / AP

Gonzaga College officers acknowledged the scenario in a statement shared on social media.

“Gonzaga College has been made conscious of the racially disparaging feedback made to visiting student-athletes and journey occasion members in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, prematurely of the NCAA Girls’s First and Second Spherical Basketball Event video games these previous a number of days,” the assertion started. 

“Hate speech in any kind is repugnant, shameful and must not ever be tolerated. We labored arduous to safe the chance to function the host establishment, and our first precedence is and have to be the protection and welfare of all student-athletes, coaches, households and supporting employees. To this finish, we’ve got labored intently with the NCAA and program individuals to assist the safety and security of everybody concerned. We’re annoyed and deeply saddened to know that what ought to all the time be an incredible customer and championship expertise was in any approach compromised by this case, for it under no circumstances displays the values, requirements, and beliefs to which we at Gonzaga College maintain ourselves accountable.”

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