150 rally to support Coach Pat Williams : IMC Worcester

About 150 students, teachers and Worcester residents gathered at City Hall tonight to support South High basketball coach Pat Williams and to call for full review the City’s failure to respond to the serious charges that have been made.

After South lost a close playoff game on Sunday night in double-overtime to Holy Name, a game in which South had been leading before a long series of fouls were called against them, Williams accused the referees of bias and possible racism. Williams' criticisms were quickly covered-up by Worcester school administrators, including Athletic Director John Pepi, and Asst. Superintendent Stephen Mills. Rather than responding to Coach Williams’ charges, Pepi and Mills quickly dismissed them by apologizing to game referees and Holy Name and threatening in the media that Coach Williams would face repercussions.

Dozens of people spoke out at the rally. They were mostly South High students, teachers, coaches, and alums, but also included people from the greater community and a teacher from North High. Four members of the South High basketball team came forth to say that they support Coach Williams "100%." Many prominent members of Worcester’s black community supported the rally and were in attendance. In addition to School Committee members Ogretta McNeil, Worcester’s Robert Thomas; James Bonds, Keesha LaTullip and William Coleman were also in attendance.

The rally began with Scott Schaeffer-Duffy, a South H.S. parent, correcting the incomplete story that has been in the local media, based on his conversations with the Coach and school principals. Schaeffer-Duffy stressed that this was not about Coach Williams blowing –up after losing an important game as the Worcester Telegram and Gazette has incorrectly implied. Coach Williams has repeatedly raised concerns within the school department this year about biased refereeing against South High. South H.S. Principal Maureen Ciccone was aware of the situation and attempted to address it earlier as well as immediately prior to Sunday’s game. Concerns about the referees had previously been brought to the attention of Athletic Director John Pepi who promised the two referees in question would not be scheduled for the South/Holy Name game. And other coaches in the WPS system have also had concerns about the referees.

Many of the speakers repeated one shared frustrations and theme, “Why is South always treated differently?” One young woman questioned frustratingly, “Why do we have 15 cops at each of our games, and on top of that the Gang Unit, and probation officers?” When a speaker asked student athletes in the crowd to raise their hand if they have felt discriminated against by officiating in a game, over 20 students responded. It was a telling moment that preceded the long line of frustrated, saddened and angry speakers to follow.

South students were all extremely thankful that many of their ‘good’ teachers were not only courageous enough to attend but also to speak. Teachers and a former South coach all talked about how South is treated differently, and the stigma faced by all students. “You gotta’ stand-up for your rights!”, shouted one, while a much loved Math teacher asked, why couldn’t the School Department have done some statistical analysis of past games before jumping to conclusions without any facts.

There were no kind words for the Worcester Telegram & Gazette that came under fire not only for their biased and incomplete reporting on this story, but questions were also raised about their own favoritism in recent South hoop stories.

As the rally wound down, Janae Bradshaw, another South High parent who said she goes to all the boys games, and not just South’s, called for action. “It’s time something’s done about this. These kids shouldn’t be treated like this and it’s our responsibility to demand things change.” Ms. Bradshaw went on to challenge all in attendance, “I’ve called school people, but all of us here need to call, and we need to keep calling until things change!” Someone in the crowd later cried out, “I’ll come back here if I have to!”

Support Coach Williams Rally

Part of the South High School team

Support Coach Williams Rally

Teacher from North High School shows support.

Support Coach Williams Rally

South High Math teacher .... "Let's look at the numbers. It would be very easy to research statistics and determine if there has been any bias."

Support Coach Williams Rally

Coveage of the Williams Rally

I was so ashamed of Worcester after seeing the torrent of criticism Coach Williams recieved on Tuesday for his suggestion that his team was the victim of referee bias, but I was so proud of this city after attending the rally in front of City Hall. A large and diverse crowd came together, on extremely short notice and took the high ground to correct misconceptions, provide more evidence that racism and other bias exist in Worcester, and, most importantly, to suggest positive remedies. Numerous people suggested that this controversy provided Worcester with an "opportunity" to improve the situation, to help us all become more sensitive toward race, class, gender, and sexual orientation. The night ended with a group hug. The T&G reporter asked what I hoped to get out of the event and I said that the people of Worcester needed to know the full story about the event, that Coach Williams had raised this issue many times before and that his remarks were not those of a sore loser playing the race card. I also told the reporter that we wanted an independent investigation of his allegations. The reporter asked what I thought of the turnout, and I said that I had organized many protests with greater advance preparation that turned out only a fraction of the people. He agreed that it was a very large crowd.
After the rally, I was told that a caller on the Jordan Levy show called in to say, "I drove by City Hall and there are only 30 people at the rally. I hope a bus runs over Scott Schaeffer Duffy." This morning's T& G includes a photo taken very early in the rally which depicts about 40 people. It also includes another photo which I looked at quickly and said, "Why is there a picture of some white guy?" My daughter pointed out to me that it was me. I replied, "It's still some white guy." The article confirmed my fears. All of the quotes, save two in the last paragraph, are of white people. No where is the size of the rally described. The introductory sentence leads the readers to believe that only South High fans or employees attended. One might think it was a bunch of disgruntled fans.
The quote from the football coach that he has heard opposing teams use the N-word for the South team was important corroborating evidence of Coach Williams' concerns, but featuring it so prominently (5 paragraphs) will only fuel the fury of those who are complaining against Coach Williams on talk radio. They'll be saying, "I went to the Holy ;Name-South basketball game and never heard the refs use the n-word." People seem to have no awareness of how studies have shown that black male kindergarten students are punished five times more often for the same infractions as are white males, how black males are seldom tracked for college, how black males are many times more likely to be jailed for the same offense as are whites, and on and on. Most people have virtually no idea how pervasive and insidious racism is in our society. As I said last night, it is the job of minorities to alert us all. I need women to point out to me when I am being sexist. I need Jews to chide me on anti-semetism. I need gays to check my homophobia and I need Latinos, Asians, Blacks and others to check my racial biases. We've become very sensitive to sexual abuse, but we still blame the victim when it comes to race. This has got to stop and won't do so until all our institutions, especially the press, starts publicizing all the facts in an incident like this one. People need to know the truth about Coach Williams and about our rally. I urge everyone to call the T&G and complain about today's coverage. All those who came out last night, especially those black parents, teachers, and students who had the courage to speak out, deserve to have been heard. Let's move forward on this issue. Let's stop misrepresenting the facts. Last night's rally was a beautiful event. My heartfelt thanks go out to everyone who came.

Not bad

Nice article. I just have a few suggestions if I may. More details about the calls at the game or pervious games to support the accusations of bias would be helpful. Merely stating that there was alot of fouls called doesn't do much to paint a picture of what happened.

Another though was, although I am glad so many people showed up for the rally, some of the pictures taken don't really display that these people are upset with racism and bias in the community. Sticking with pictures of people speaking or holding signs helps the article more than having posed pictures of a group of people smiling like everything is fine.

From a personal stand point, I attended Holy Name for two years during the 90's and witnessed many actions that would be seen as unsportsperson like conduct or down right cheating. These actions included but where not limited to junior varsity coaches suiting up as varsity players and playing football under the impression that they were high school students. Having witnessed these actions myself, I would have no trouble believeing that Holy Name would try to influence an important basketball game via the referees.

Smiling people

Thanks for your comments. There are a lot of smiling people because this was a very positive event. South students expressed a lot of pride in their school, and were not content to "play the victim" in this situation.

150 rally to support Coach Pat Williams

150 Rally to Support South High Coach Pat Williams & to Call for a Full Review

Support Coach Williams Rally

Support Coach Williams Rally

Support Coach Williams Rally

Support Coach Williams Rally

Support Coach Williams Rally

Support Coach Williams Rally

Support Coach Williams Rally

Support Coach Williams Rally

Support Coach Williams Rally

Support Coach Williams Rally

Support Coach Williams Rally

Coveage of the Williams Rally

Not bad

Smiling people