High school's chant of 'USA! USA!' deemed racist (video)

Racial incident mars high school game
School district, students apologize
Author: Brian Mylar, Reporter, bmylar@ksat.com
Published On: Mar 05 2012 06:25:45 PM CST Updated On: Mar 05 2012 10:00:24 PM CST




SAN ANTONIO -

A local school district is apologizing after an apparent incident of racism at a boys high school basketball game this past weekend.

When the final whistle blew Saturday, Alamo Heights celebrated a convincing victory over San Antonio Edison.

Alamo Heights Head Coach Andrew Brewer said he was proud of his team.

"Tremendously proud,” Brewer said. “Tremendously. It's the best group of kids."

But it was just after the trophy presentation when the coach was not proud of the chant coming from Alamo Heights fans.

"USA, USA, USA," they chanted.

San Antonio Independent School District officials took the chant as a racial insult to a school with all minority players from a school with mostly white ones.

On the KSAT 12 Defenders Facebook page, Santos Villarreal's post reads “this has to stop.”

SAISD Spokeswoman Leslie Price heard about the incident after it had happened.

"This is very disrespectful to our students,” Price said.

She said the district is glad the coach put a stop to the chant immediately and hopes Alamo Heights addresses it quickly.

"It is surprising and it's disappointing to hear that anyone would be out there making those kind of remarks," Price said.

Edison students who attended Saturday's game were shocked when they heard the chant. Some thought the fans of the victors should have been better behaved.

Ruby Arredondo and Forest Lebaron are seniors at Edison and Julian Castellano is a junior.

"I was very surprised,” Castellano said. “Very appalled."

"They didn't really have any class," Arredondo said.

"It just rubbed us the wrong way," Lebaron said.

Alamo Heights Superintendent Dr. Kevin Brown also apologized for the chant.

"We just hope that people know that that's not who we are and we're not going to let it happen again," Brown said.

Alamo Heights has apologized to SAISD and the students identified will also have to apologize and have been banned from the state title games.

"We think that you have to earn a right to be there and that's not a reflection of our school district," Brown said.

Both districts are now just trying to move past this disturbing incident.

Another SAISD school, Lanier High, faced a similar incident within the last year from students in the Cedar Park school district.