I have been covering high school sports for nearly 40 years, and I can say I have seen just about everything one can see. Or so I thought.
However, I was not prepared for what I saw on a video sent to me earlier this week capturing what happened on the field after Washington High defeated Cardinal Ritter College Prep 28-14 last Friday night in Massillon, Ohio.
The video shows the tail end of a post-game altercation between the two teams, then a group of Massillon police officers rushing onto the field and pepper-spraying the Cardinal Ritter players. It was pretty stunning to see that happen on a football field.
From the looks of the video, only Cardinal Ritter players were being sprayed as the Washington players looked on while moving back.
“At that point when they started spraying, everybody was separated,” said Ritter assistant coach Sean Morris. “They were spraying directly in our kids’ faces. By the time I got inside the locker room, I couldn’t breathe for another two or three hours.”
Although no video has surfaced showing what happened before the altercation, I did review a few recent YouTube clips of Washington’s post-game run-ins with other opposing teams, all from Ohio. The first was against No. 1-ranked St. Edward after a big 31-0 upset victory by Washington this season. There was a little jousting and a lot of “woofing” at midfield, but nothing too serious. The coaches were able to defuse the situation.
The next one was a late-season victory over their big rivals from Canton McKinley, which was dated in 2023. The postgame handshake turned into a free-for-all. It got really out of control. What I saw on the tape were a bunch of adults and even police trying to separate kids and restore some kind of order to a completely chaotic situation.
What I never saw in either video was police officers rushing in to pepper-spray a bunch of high school athletes. But that’s exactly what happened last Friday night — this time to a visiting team that had traveled nearly 600 miles from St. Louis, Missouri. The response was much more aggressive. It was a really bad look.
When I saw those Ritter coaches and kids scrambling to escape the pepper spray fired by police officers, splashing water in each others’ eyes for relief, it hit home because those could’ve been my sons and grandsons out there. I was both angry and heartbroken.
What was also disappointing is that this was supposed to be a tremendous high school experience for the Cardinal Ritter kids and their coaches. Massillon has a rich high school football history. It is nationally known. The city has its own museum for the football program.
The stadium is named after Paul Brown, who coached in the National Football League with the Cincinnati Bengals and Cleveland Browns. The Browns were named after Paul Brown, who founded the franchise. Brown was once the head coach at Washington.
And just about 15 minutes down the road from Massillon is Canton, which is the site of the Pro Football Hall of Fame. The Cardinal Ritter players had the opportunity to visit the Hall of Fame and take the tour. Among the exhibits they visited was the Black College Football Hall of Fame.
This was all supposed to be part of a great educational experience. These are stories that the players can tell their children and grandchildren years from now. Instead, this experience turned into a very ugly and traumatic one for these young student-athletes from St. Louis. This should never have happened to them.
For decades, St. Louis area high school teams have traveled to other states to participate in games and sports activities. Parents have an expectation that their kids, who are safe when they leave St. Louis, will be safe while they’re away and return home unharmed. They don’t envision out-of-town police officers spraying them with a stinging chemical at the end of a hard-fought, emotional game.
“I’ve never in my life been a part of anything like this,” Morris said. “In 2025, there is no way that you Mace some 15- and 16-year-old high school kids.”
Earl Austin, Jr. is sports editor of The St. Louis American.
For those wanting more context, the Massillon Police Department released a statement, claiming that officers gave multiple commands to the Cardinal Ritter players to leave the field and go to their respective locker room. These commands were ignored.
Police also claim that at one point a Massillon player’s mask was grabbed and then that player was subsequently surrounded and chased by Ritter players. After Ritter players once again attempted to charge at Massillon players, police used spray.
Police also provided clearer footage of part of the incident, including a top-down view of the field.
Lawsuit. City of Massilon. What exactly did the footage show?
Covering high school sports for 40 years, and don’t bother to get the police point of view? Disgraceful “journalism.”
If they didn’t act like thugs and learn to listen to coaches, they would’ve been fine. Act like criminals and get treated like criminals.