adplus-dvertising
Connect with us

Sports

Boos, jeers interrupt NFL players’ moment of silence for racial equality – Global News

Published

 on


NFLers fell silent and stood arm-in-arm to call for racial equality on Thursday night — and some fans in the stands booed them for it.

The not-so-silent moment of silence played out in front of some 17,000 fans at Arrowhead Stadium in Kansas City, Mo., on Thursday, ahead of the NFL season opener between the hometown Chiefs and the Houston Texans.

Read more:
‘Rachel Dolezal 2.0’: White prof Jessica Krug admits she posed as Black woman

“Please join us for a moment of silence dedicated to the ongoing fight for equality in our country,” the stadium announcer said, just before the planned moment of silence.

The players linked arms and the volume in the stadium instantly went up, as many fans loudly tried to disrupt the brief gesture. Boos, whistles, shouts and jeers rang out from the stands, and fans cheered loudly after the roughly 10-second moment ended.

Story continues below advertisement


Kansas City Chiefs players, including quarterback Patrick Mahomes (15), stand for a presentation on social justice before an NFL football game against the Houston Texans Thursday, Sept. 10, 2020, in Kansas City, Mo.


AP Photo/Charlie Riedel

The players’ gesture of respect — and the fans’ gestures of disrespect — came at a moment of turmoil in the United States. The country has been wracked by protests over systemic racism and police brutality triggered by the death of George Floyd in police custody last May. Those protests have been fuelled by several other incidents of Black people being injured or killed by law enforcement, along with incendiary calls for “law and order” from the White House.






1:36
Trump admits in audio tapes systemic racism exists, dismisses white privilege


Trump admits in audio tapes systemic racism exists, dismisses white privilege

Roughly two-thirds of all NFL players are Black. Nearly all of the league’s owners are white, with two exceptions: a Pakistani-American man and an Asian-American woman.

Story continues below advertisement

The league has seen many acts of protest around police brutality in recent years, dating back to Colin Kaepernick taking a knee during the national anthem in 2016. Players have occasionally followed Kaepernick’s example since that happened, sparking outrage among some of their conservative fans. Kaepernick himself was blackballed by the league’s owners and hasn’t played since his season of protest.






2:06
‘Believe in something, even if it means sacrificing everything’: Colin Kaepernick in Nike commercial


‘Believe in something, even if it means sacrificing everything’: Colin Kaepernick in Nike commercial

The league has also become a lightning rod for criticism from U.S. President Donald Trump, who has repeatedly mischaracterized the players’ calls for equality as disrespect for the American anthem and flag.

Read more:
‘Losers’ and ‘suckers’: Trump denies insulting fallen American soldiers

The Chiefs and Texans had discussed how they would address the pregame before it happened on Thursday, and opted to show their solidarity in a moment separate from the anthem.

Story continues below advertisement

There was no live version of the anthem. Instead, Alicia Keys appeared on video to perform Lift Every Voice and Sing, a Black anthem, before The Star-Spangled Banner played on the video board. The visiting Texans remained in their locker room for the anthem and emerged afterwards to a chorus of boos.

“The moment of unity I personally thought was good,” Texans player J.J. Watt told reporters after the game. “The booing during that moment (of silence) was unfortunate,” he added. “I don’t fully understand that. There was no flag involved. There was nothing involved other than two teams coming together to show unity.”

The NFL tweeted a seemingly volume-controlled clip of the moment on Thursday night. However, broadcast footage and fan videos capture the sounds of the boos, which rang out shortly after the players lined up together.

Story continues below advertisement

Both head coaches claimed ignorance when it came to the boos.

“Maybe they were just booing us because we had just come on the field as the visiting team,” Texans coach Bill O’Brien said after the game. “But yeah, I thought that that was a nice gesture,” he said.

Chiefs coach Andy Reid also claimed not to hear the boos.

“I’m proud of our players but I’m also proud of our fans,” he said after the game. “They were loud.”

Read more:
Man takes on the ‘lie’ of boneless chicken ‘wings’ in viral public rant

Several players from the game and from other teams said they were confused by the response.

“We wanted to show unity and we wanted to show we’re going to come together and fight the good fight,” Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes said.

Baltimore Ravens quarterback Robert Griffin III expressed his disbelief on Twitter.

“How can you be more upset about bringing awareness to racism than racism itself?” he tweeted.

Story continues below advertisement

Griffin also shared a video put out by the NFL Players Association on Thursday, which sought to explain why players are calling for justice. The video features Kaepernick, Griffin and several other players explaining their positions, responding to Trump and their far-right critics.

“All this stuff is going on in our country, and police are really killing Black people at an alarming rate,” Buffalo Bills player Josh Norman says in the video. “You’re going to take that and say we’re kneeling against the flag?”

Kansas City councilman Eric Brunch said it was an “embarrassing” moment for the city.

“Some NFL fans booing the players for standing and locking arms in a moment of silent unity proves that for them the ‘standing for the flag’ was always about perpetuating white supremacy,” he tweeted. “Let’s do better, KC.”

Story continues below advertisement

Members of the Kansas City Chiefs stand united for with locked arms before the start of a gam against the Houston Texans at Arrowhead Stadium on September 10, 2020 in Kansas City, Missouri.


Members of the Kansas City Chiefs stand united for with locked arms before the start of a gam against the Houston Texans at Arrowhead Stadium on September 10, 2020 in Kansas City, Missouri.


Jamie Squire/Getty Images

The NBA has gone even further than the NFL with its calls for racial justice. Last month, NBA players organized their own brief strike to protest the police shooting of Jacob Blake, a Black man who was shot in the back in Kenosha, Wis.

Several other major-league sports followed the NBA’s example, although the NFL was not playing at the time.

Story continues below advertisement

The NFL kicked off its season on Thursday in front of a dramatically reduced crowd due to the risk of COVID-19. The Chiefs’ stadium typically holds 80,000 fans, but only 17,000 were allowed at the game.

The Super Bowl-defending Chiefs won the game 34-20.

—With files from Reuters and The Associated Press

© 2020 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.

Let’s block ads! (Why?)

728x90x4

Source link

Continue Reading

Sports

Washington Capitals 3-2 win ends Dallas Stars’ winning streak

Published

 on

 

WASHINGTON (AP) — Tom Wilson, Dylan Strome and Taylor Raddysh scored to help the Washington Capitals end the Dallas Stars’ season-opening winning streak at four with a 3-2 victory Thursday night.

Wilson’s goal was his third in three games, Strome his second of the season and Raddysh his first since joining the team in free agency last summer. Charlie Lindgren made 22 saves as the Capitals wrapped up this early homestand with back-to-back wins.

The Stars fell from the ranks of the league’s unbeaten teams despite a short-handed goal by Colin Blackwell and one at even strength from Jason Robertson. Rookie Oskar Bäck set up Blackwell for his first NHL point.

Casey DeSmith was screened on two of the three goals he allowed on 26 shots.

LIGHTNING 4, GOLDEN KNIGHTS 3

TAMPA, Fla. (AP) — Nikita Kucherov scored the winning goal with less than a minute to play just 1:27 after Brandon Hagel had tied it and Tampa Bay rallied to beat Vegas.

Kucherov’s second goal of the game with 55 seconds left was his sixth of the season.

Janis Moser had a goal and two assists for the Lightning, who remain unbeaten. Andrei Vasilevskiy made 22 saves.

Brayden McNabb, Pavel Dorofeyev and Ivan Barbashev had goals for Vegas. Adin Hill turned aside 21 shots.

Jack Eichel, with two assists on Thursday, now has 10 points this season in five games and reached reached double-digit points faster than any other player in Vegas history. He is the 10th U.S.-born player to accomplish the feat.

After Barbashev put Vegas up 3-2 early in the second, Hagel pulled Tampa Bay even at 3 with 2:22 remaining in the third.

BLUE JACKETS 6, SABRES 4

COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — Kirill Marchenko and Mathieu Olivier each had a goal and an assist and Daniil Tarasov made 21 saves to help Columbus to a win over Buffalo.

Yegor Chinakhov, Adam Fantilli, Zachary Aston-Reese and Damon Severson also scored for Columbus, and Zach Werenski added two assists.

Ryan McLeod, Owen Power and JJ Peterka scored for Buffalo, and Jiri Kulich added his first NHL goal. Devon Lev stopped 19 shots for the Sabres (1-5-1), who have lost two straight road games and five of their first six overall.

CANUCKS 3, FLORIDA 2, OT

SUNRISE, Fla. (AP) — J.T. Miller scored 2:09 into overtime and Vancouver got their first win of the season, beating Florida.

Teddy Blueger and Quinn Hughes had goals for Vancouver, with Kevin Lankinen stopping 26 shots.

Anton Lundell got his fourth goal in the last three games for Florida and Jesper Boqvist also scored for the Panthers, who got 30 saves from Sergei Bobrovsky.

Florida remained without forwards Aleksander Barkov (lower body) and Matthew Tkachuk (illness).

DEVILS 3, SENATORS 1

OTTAWA, Ontario (AP) — Jacob Markstrom stopped 30 shots and lost his shutout bid in the final minutes as New Jersey beat Ottawa.

Erik Haula, Nathan Bastian and Paul Cotter scored for the Devils, who won for the third time in four games and improved to 5-2-0.

The Senators, who were coming off an 8-7 overtime victory against Los Angeles on Monday, struggled to beat Markstrom.

Brady Tkachuk was the only scorer for the Senators, beating Markstrom, with a power-play goal with 65 seconds remaining in the third period.

Anton Forsberg, making his second straight start and hoping to rebound after getting pulled Monday, made 32 saves in the loss.

Haula opened the scoring early in the second period and Bastian added a short-handed goal, giving New Jersey a 2-0 lead after 40 minutes. Cotter scored midway through the third.

RANGERS 5, RED WING 2

DETROIT (AP) — Artemi Panarin had his eighth career hat trick and New York rolled to a victory over Detroit.

Panarin became the first Rangers player to have multiple points in the first four games of a season. He scored twice on the power play. Vincent Trocheck also had a power- play goal and assisted on all of Panarin’s goals.

Jonathan Quick made 29 saves in his season debut. Victor Mancini also scored.

The Rangers have won the last five meetings, including twice this week. New York had a 4-1 home victory over Detroit on Monday night.

Moritz Seider and J.T. Compher scored for Detroit. Red Wings goalie Cam Talbot was pulled in the second period after allowing five goals.

KINGS 4, CANADIENS 1

MONTREAL (AP) — David Rittich made 26 saves a night after being benched in the second period in Toronto, helping road-weary Los Angeles snap a three-game losing streak with a victory over Montreal.

Los Angeles improved to 2-1-2 on a season-opening, seven-game trip necessitated by arena renovations.

Rittich rebounded after allowing four goals on 14 shots in a 6-2 loss to the Maple Leafs. Alex Laferriere, Mikey Anderson, Andreas Englund and Adrian Kempe scored.

Justin Barron scored for Montreal (2-3-0). Sam Montembeault stopped 28 shots. He made a save on Kevin Fiala on a penalty shot.

BLUES 1, ISLANDERS 0, OT

ST. LOUIS (AP) — Joel Hofer made 34 saves and assisted on Jake Neighbours’ goal at 2:04 of overtime in St. Louis victory over New York.

Hofer had his second career shutout in his and the team’s second overtime victory of the season.

Philip Broberg carried the puck into the New York zone and made a centering pass to Neighbours for the winner.

Islanders goalie Ilya Sorkin made 29 saves.

Blues defenseman Nick Leddy sat out because of a lower-body injury, the first game he has missed this season. Leddy played in all 82 games last season.

OILERS 4, PREDATORS 2

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — Brett Kulak scored twice and Connor McDavid added his first goal of the season to lead Edmonton to a victory over reeling Nashville.

Jeff Skinner also scored and Calvin Pickard made 25 saves for the defending Western Conference champion Oilers, who have won consecutive games after beginning the season with a three-game skid.

Filip Forsberg and Jonathan Marchessault scored and Juuse Saros made 32 saves for Nashville (0-4).

Forsberg’s goal midway through the first period gave Nashville its first lead of the season. That lasted less than six minutes before Kulak tied it.

Kulak sealed it with an empty-netter in the final minute for the defenseman’s first career two-goal game.

BLACKHAWKS 4, SHARKS 2

CHICAGO (AP) — Tyler Bertuzzi and Nick Foligno each scored a power-play goal, and Chicago beat San Jose.

Taylor Hall and Jason Dickinson also scored for Chicago. Connor Bedard and Teuvo Teravainen each had two assists.

Hall, who missed most of last season because of right knee surgery, put the Blackhawks in front 4:20 into the first period. It was Hall’s first goal since Nov. 5 and No. 267 for his career.

Tyler Toffoli and Fabian Zetterlund scored for San Jose, which trailed 3-0 early in the second. William Eklund and Mikael Granlund had two assists each.

The Sharks dropped to 0-2-2 under Ryan Warsofsky, who was promoted to head coach in June.

Petr Mrazek had 20 saves for Chicago, and Vitek Vanecek made 23 stops for San Jose.

KRAKEN 6, FLYERS 4

SEATTLE (AP) — Eeli Tolvanen, Jordan Eberle, and Shane Wright scored three goals in less than three minutes in the second period and Seattle held off a Philadelphia rally in a victory.

Tolvanen’s goal broke a 2-2 tie at the 14:57 mark. Eberle made it a two-goal game with a goal at 17:44. Eight seconds later, Wright scored to give Seattle a three-goal lead.

Jared McCann tied the game at 2-2 with the first of Seattle’s four second-period goals.

Cam York and Jamie Drysdale scored to pull Philadelphia within 5-4 in the third period, but Oliver Bjorkstrand responded with a goal to push Seattle’s lead to two with just over five minutes left in the game.

Scott Laughton scored twice for the Flyers in the first period, while Brandon Montour scored one in for the Kraken.

Chandler Stephenson had an assist in his 500th NHL game. Seattle’s Philipp Grubauer had 21 saves.

Source link

Continue Reading

Sports

Canada’s Dabrowski, New Zealand’s Routliffe out of Japan Women’s Open after walkover

Published

 on

 

OSAKA, Japan – Canada’s Gabriela Dabrowski and New Zealand’s Erin Routliffe are out of the Japan Women’s Open tennis tournament.

Spain’s Cristina Bucsa and Romania’s Monica Niculescu advanced to the final on Thursday by way of walkover.

The fourth seeds were supposed to play the top-seeded Dabrowski and Routliffe in the semifinals.

Bucsa and Niculescu will next face third-seeded Ena Shibahara of Japan and Laura Siegemund of Germany in the final.

Dabrowski and Routliffe defeated Japan’s Shuko Aoyama and Eri Hozumi in the quarterfinals 6-2, 6-4 on Wednesday to advance.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 17, 2024.

The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.

Source link

Continue Reading

Sports

Mountain West commissioner says she’s heartbroken over turmoil surrounding San Jose State volleyball

Published

 on

 

LAS VEGAS (AP) — Mountain West Conference Commissioner Gloria Nevarez said Thursday the forfeitures that volleyball teams are willing to take to avoid playing San Jose State is “not what we celebrate in college athletics” and that she is heartbroken over what has transpired this season surrounding the Spartans and their opponents.

Four teams have canceled games against San Jose State: Boise State, Southern Utah, Utah State and Wyoming, with none of the schools explicitly saying why they were forfeiting.

A group of Nevada players issued a statement saying they will not take the floor when the Wolf Pack are scheduled to host the Spartans on Oct. 26. They cited their “right to safety and fair competition,” though their school reaffirmed Thursday that the match is still planned and that state law bars forfeiture “for reasons related to gender identity or expression.”

All those schools, except Southern Utah, are in the Mountain West. New Mexico, also in the MWC, went ahead with its home match on Thursday night, which was won by the Spartans, 3-1, the team’s first victory since Sept. 24.

“It breaks my heart because they’re human beings, young people, student-athletes on both sides of this issue that are getting a lot of national negative attention,” Nevarez said in an interview with The Associated Press at Mountain West basketball media days. “It just doesn’t feel right to me.”

Republican governors of Idaho, Nevada, Utah and Wyoming have made public statements in support of the cancellations, citing a need for fairness in women’s sports. Former President Donald Trump, the GOP nominee in this year’s presidential race, this week referenced an unidentified volleyball match when he was asked during a Fox News town hall about transgender athletes in women’s sports.

“I saw the slam, it was a slam. I never saw a ball hit so hard, hit the girl in the head,” Trump replied before he was asked what can be done. “You just ban it. The president bans it. You just don’t let it happen.”

After Trump’s comment, San Diego State issued a statement that said “it has been incorrectly reported that an San Diego State University student-athlete was hit in the face with a volleyball during match play with San Jose State University. The ball bounced off the shoulder of the student-athlete, and the athlete was uninjured and did not miss a play.”

San Jose State has not made any direct comments about the politicians’ “fairness” references, and Nevarez did not go into details.

“I’m learning a lot about the issue,” Nevarez said. “I don’t know a lot of the language yet or the science or the understanding nationally of how this issue plays out. The external influences are so far on either side. We have an election year. It’s political, so, yeah, it feels like a no-win based on all the external pressure.”

The cancellations could mean some teams will not qualify for the conference tournament Nov. 27-30 in Las Vegas, where the top six schools are slated to compete for the league championship.

“The student-athlete (in question) meets the eligibility standard, so if a team does not play them, it’s a forfeit, meaning they take a loss,” Nevarez said.

Ahead of the Oct. 26 match in Reno. Nevada released a statement acknowledging that “a majority of the Wolf Pack women’s volleyball team” had decided to forfeit against San Jose State. The school said only the university can take that step but any player who decides not to play would face no punishment.

___

AP college sports:

The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.

Source link

Continue Reading

Trending