Members of the University of Utah women's basketball team were allegedly subjected to racial hate crimes during their time at the 2024 NCAA Tournament.
With the Utes set to play in Spokane, Wash., the team was stationed in nearby Coeur d'Alene, Idaho, about a 35-mile trip from the campus of Gonzaga University, the site of first- and second-round games. During the first night of the trip, members of Utah's traveling party were met with racial epithets.
As the traveling party walked to dinner, a truck drove near, revved its engines, and yelled the N-word toward the team, according to multiple accounts. After the dinner, the team was met with two trucks that revved their engines before yelling the same epithet.
"We all just were in shock, and we looked at each other like, did we just hear that? ... Everybody was in shock — our cheerleaders, our students that were in that area that heard it clearly were just frozen," Utah deputy athletics director Charmelle Green said to KSL.com. "We kept walking, just shaking our heads, like I can't believe that."
With team members fearing for their safety, the university worked with the NCAA and host school Gonzaga to move the team to a hotel in Spokane, Wash. The team, however, had already been impacted by the effects of the racism it was subjected to.
The university offered the following statement regarding the incident:
We are frustrated and deeply saddened to know that what should always be an amazing visitor and championship experience was in any way compromised by this situation, for it in no way reflects the values, standards, and beliefs to which we at Gonzaga University hold ourselves accountable.
As the Utes' time in the tournament came to an end, head coach Lynne Roberts shared her account of what happened and how it impacted her team during its time at the tournament.
Lynne Roberts' response to what happened when her team was staying in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho, as part of the NCAA Tournament. pic.twitter.com/H96Enj2tKi
— Josh Furlong (@JFurKSL) March 26, 2024
"You think in our world, in athletics and university settings, it's shocking. There's so much diversity on a college campus and so you're just not exposed to that very often," Roberts said. "And so when you are, it's like, you have people say, 'Man, I can't believe that happened.' But racism is real and it happens, and it's awful.
"So for our players, whether they are white, black, green, whatever, no one knew how to handle it and it was really upsetting. And for our players and staff to not feel safe in an NCAA Tournament environment, that's messed up."
The university has filed a police report, but there have not been any updates since the report was filed, per KSL.com. The alleged incident would likely fall under Idaho's malicious harassment statute, which states:
It shall be unlawful for any person, maliciously and with the specific intent to intimidate or harass another person because of that person’s race, color, religion, ancestry, or national origin, to:
(a) Cause physical injury to another person; or
(b) Damage, destroy, or deface any real or personal property of another person; or
(c) Threaten, by word or act, to do the acts prohibited if there is reasonable cause to believe that any of the acts described in subsections (a) and (b) of this section will occur.
On Tuesday, March 26, Coeur d'Alene Resort, the Kootenai County Task Force on Human Relations and Coeur d'Alene Mayor James Hammond held a joint press conference to address the incident.
The press conference was ended after it was disrupted by Dave Reilly of the Idaho Freedom Foundation, a group with a self-described mission "to defeat Marxism and socialism by building a culture of liberty around America's founding principles so that Idahoans can prosper."
NOW: The press conference on the racism the University of Utah women’s team experienced in CDA was disrupted by Dave Reilly of the Idaho Freedom Foundation. pic.twitter.com/jm9uMRiE5g
— Alexandra (Alex) Duggan (@dugganreports) March 26, 2024
We'll continue to add updates as this story develops.
