WHHS coaches respond to racism in Cincinnati

Post date: Feb 16, 2018 4:31:59 PM

Published 2/16/18

By Aaron Espelage, '18

During an Elder vs. St. Xavier basketball game on Feb. 2, Elder’s student section chanted racist remarks directed at multiple St. X players. The chants ranged from stereotypes regarding an Asian player and African American player on St. X’s team to homophobic slurs. Our WHHS varsity mens and womens, head coaches were asked to weigh in.

“I thought it was absolutely disgusting. And I was exceptionally taken back by the fact that they were chanting the term “faggot”. It’s baffling,” women’s varsity basketball coach Adam Lazar said.

Mens varsity basketball coach Ricardo Hill echoed similar sentiments. “I just kept thinking about how the kid and his parents must feel when hearing that nonsense from the crowd. But I was glad to see that St. X’s coach alerted the referees immediately,” Hill said.

Both Lazar and Hill have dealt with similar racially charged issues during road games. “We had an issue last year in Kentucky with officials being overtly racist,” Lazar said. “They called one of my assistant coaches a boy and then openly favored the [primarily-white] home team. I ended up getting ejected after I let them know I would not tolerate it. Then after the game we discussed how wrong it truly was with our kids and handled it internally.”

Hill said, “We were playing a team in our league a couple years ago, when the student section held up a whiteboard that singled out one of our kids. They wrote that he was an n-word. Everyone saw it and was outraged. After I alerted the officials, the board was erased and although it was immediately addressed, it was not publicized.”

“There’s no excuse for administration not stepping in immediately,” Lazar said. “We as coaches must teach respect, diversity and the understanding of all cultures. And handle such issues as soon as they arise,” Hill said. Lazar and Hill both emphasized the importance of immediately denouncing the outbursts.

“Unfortunately racism will never go away as it was one of the principles that this country was founded upon.” Lazar said. “Americans view everything in the scope of race. Sadly, it’s the American way and it’s not going anywhere.”

Hill said, “The real problem is hidden, systematic racism. And I can’t say that it’s going to disappear. We must address that with the way that parents, teachers and coaches raise their kids to perceive other cultures from an early age.”

Lazar and Hill share the same vision of teaching kids cultural diversity to avoid the heinous actions that have taken place across multiple high school basketball games. The coaches hope that WHHS, a school rich with cultural diversity, can set the standard for other high schools to follow when it comes to handling blatant and systematic racism.