Another fight may be good time to end season

The next brawl at a boys CIAC high school basketball game should bring an end to the 2022-23 season. Put the balls away. Try again next winter as better humans.

Maybe that would wake up people.

Within 15 New England nights in January, there were explosive post-game fights in New Haven and Middletown, a bench-clearing incident in Bloomfield and an on-court spectator fight in Vermont that left a 60-year-old man dead.

There also were arrests stemming from a fight involving teenage spectators just before a Grasso Tech-Vinal Tech game.

When James Naismith hung two peach baskets at Springfield College in 1891 this couldn’t have been what he had in mind.

“It hurts and it’s scary,” said East Catholic’s Luke Reilly, coach of the No. 1 ranked high school team in Connecticut. “Unfortunately, I don’t think young people are able to wrap their mind about how scary it can be until it’s experienced or seen and then, ‘Whoa, that’s what it is.’”

What has occurred is repeated violence.

Not boys will be boys. Not, oh, this stuff at games has gone on for years. Not it’s the officials’ fault for making horrible calls that upset parents. Not the fault of the person who invented the handshake line. Violence.

Repeated violence that needs greater prevention and uniform accountability. And I’m not sure there’s a better solution right now than scared straight. Fight again. Maybe no more ball.

A post-game handshake line after the Bassick-Wilbur Cross game on Jan. 16 led to a mad scramble and punches thrown across the court by players and spectators.

Same situation a few nights later in a handshake line between Weaver and Middletown. Video showed a wild melee involving more than 50 players and spectators and one guy on the floor getting pummeled by a handful of spectators.

That was followed on Jan. 27 by what has been described as one player throwing down another during a game and the Bloomfield and New Britain benches emptying.

So maybe the next brawl should be followed by, “No Run to the Sun!” Only a walk into the darkness.

On Tuesday night, a fight broke out among several spectators at a middle-school basketball game in Alburgh, Vermont. Russell Giroux, who was involved, according to WPTZ in Burlington, was driving home when he called for help.

In the pastoral land of Ben & Jerry’s, adults brawled at a game involving 12- and 13-yearold boys. A 60-year-old man died. If that doesn’t lead to collective introspection, nothing will.

Remember when COVID lifted its horrible grip? We were going to return with an abiding

love for the sports we play and watch. We would savor the games and be thankful.

How did that turn out? I went to the Bassick at East Catholic game the other night for two reasons:

After a Wilbur Cross player was knocked to the floor in the Jan. 16 brawl, video shows a Bassick player swooping in and throwing a roundhouse haymaker at the prone player. It was egregious and I wanted to see if that player was in uniform. He wasn’t.

The second reason was to talk to Luke Reilly, as good a coach as there is in state high school basketball. His dad, his uncle, his brother, there is no greater family legacy of coaching the game in Connecticut.

Adult spectators obviously should know better. Parents can’t get so caught up in a referee’s call, their kid’s playing time or some opposing parent’s taunts that they lose their mind. Young spectators can’t use some players shoving post-game as an excuse to start a riot.

If spectators can’t control themselves, they shouldn’t be allowed at a youth game. They should be in therapy. So maybe another brawl that involves spectators means no more fans for the rest of the season. Maybe allow the games, but parents stay home.

The three Connecticut fights, however, started with players. That’s why I wanted to ask Reilly about what he thinks.

“Sports in general are so emotional,” Reilly said. “We preach every day — this translates to fighting, but really it translates to being a better basketball player, too: Can you detach from your emotions in the heat of the moment?

“It’s easy when you’re not hot or not in the moment. As young people, it’s a skill that needs to be worked on. That’s one of the benefits of sports, because you are in a situation where it means the world to you. Do you have the ability to take a step back and detach emotionally and make a good decision or communicate effectively?

“If it is bigger as a societal problem, if there is more violence in society, in school, in sports, it’s still our job as coaches to teach our athletes how to deal with things emotionally. I don’t have the solution. That one answer. I do know it’s something you’ve got to talk about on a daily basis because it’s that serious.”

The heat of the moment. A push in a game does not always need to be answered with a shove. The retaliator is more liable to get caught than the instigator. Feeling “disrespected” — oh, that word — in a handshake line is not a license to lash out physically. If you think it is, buckle up, it’s going to be a long, painful life.

Yes, young people deserve second chances. They also need to face consequences.

There is no central body or concerted effort in place in Connecticut to mete out consistent, across-the-board punishment for fights. Nor is there a mechanism in place to make decisions public so there is a greater understanding of the consequences. It comes piecemeal or not at all from school districts or the police.

Middletown police, for instance, have announced arrests. New Haven police have announced nothing.

After the Bassick player threw the haymaker, a spectator in a dark jacket and wearing a white hat battered the prone Cross player at least seven or eight times. It was disgusting. If that isn’t assault, I don’t know what assault is. That doesn’t mean he was arrested.

“The suspension question is one for the individual schools,” CIAC spokesman John Holt emailed. “And beyond that, CIAC is offering no comment.”

And my questions about kind of vehicle — perhaps some disciplinary board — the CIAC has in place to suspend schools from a sport? Whether after three fights in 10 days the CIAC sent out any sort of blanket warning to schools? And how much power the CIAC has to ban fans?

“CIAC leadership has no further comments for you,” Holt emailed back.

On Friday morning, Bassick and Wilbur Cross players, coaches and administrators met in a “restorative circle” at Floyd Little Center to take ownership of what happened, to discuss the effects the brawl had on the school and community, to mend fences and move on.

“I think it is a good thing we’re are able to bury the hatchet,” Bassick coach Bernie Lofton said. “I didn’t see any problems before the game, and I don’t think there will be any problems from now on.”

A high-minded kumbaya meeting is a good thing. Talk it over. Share some pizza. Yet it also gets back to what Reilly was discussing. What about the next time in the heat of the moment?

The real education about controlling emotions in sports ought to be happening daily along with skill instruction in sixth, seventh, eighth grade. When they’re old enough to understand and young enough to listen and be molded.

Lofton said five Bassick players were suspended for two games. At first, he said everyone was back.

When it was pointed out the player who threw the huge punch wasn’t there, Lofton said, “He’s hurt. He might not even be back on the team right now. I’m pretty much disappointed in him. So we’ll see.”

There are some provisions in the CIAC handbook:

After a second disqualification for fighting, an athlete will be ineligible for the season.

When a player is ejected, he is ineligible to participate in the next contest.

Any team that accumulates five or more disqualifications in more than one contest will be barred from post-season play.

The rules are pertinent to Bloomfield and New Britain, which combined for 17 ejections. By contrast, there were no ejections from the BassickCross melee because the officials already had left the floor.

As far as spectators, the CIAC acknowledges the school administration is responsible for policies relating to sportsmanship and the conduct of activities in the school. It does urge schools to adopt its “Class Act” program that notably calls for spectators to show respect for officials, not to cheer negatively against opponents and to cover their torsos completely.

Look, the last headache anybody wants is to be Director of Discipline. Yet without an across-theboard discipline structure it is impossible for the CIAC to live up to its own self-assigned responsibility (handbook, Page 87) of a strong, consistent statement reflecting zero tolerance for violence.