SPALDING COUNTY, Ga. — There is shocking video fans recorded of a bench-clearing brawl that broke out at a girl’s high school basketball game.
Punches were thrown all over the floor. The melee got so out of hand that officials canceled the game.
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It happened during a 4A playoff game involving Spalding High School and Wayne County High School in Jessup, Georgia on Tuesday.
Channel 2′s Tom Jones went to Spalding High where he spoke to a couple of the players involved in the fight and one of their parents during WSB Tonight at 11 p.m. They did not want to be identified.
One player said she didn’t want to fight, but one of her opponents attacked her.
“She punched me. And then everything escalated,” she said.
Another student admitted she threw punches, but only to defend her teammates.
“She grabbed my teammate. She jerked her up like this and she punched her. So then everything escalated,” the players said.
Spalding players say an adult even attacked them.
“This man, he was trying to break it up but he ended up punching me,” said one of the players.
They say the Wayne County players called them names and were overly physical.
“And the refs weren’t calling any calls and the refs watched us like argue and stuff. And they didn’t do anything about it,” she said.
Both teams were disqualified from the tournament.
“I’m very upset,” said the mother of one of the players.
She said the video makes it look like the Spalding players were the aggressors, but they weren’t. She also says there was no security and the refs did a horrible job stopping the fight.
“If you look at the video you can see the referees already backing back,” she pointed out.
Jones reached out to Dr. Sharnell Myles, a psychologist with Embark Behavioral Health. She works with teens and young adults, providing comprehensive care, including mental health services and therapy.
Dr. Myles reacted to the video of the brawl.
“Oftentimes when you see big fights like that there’s a breakdown somewhere,” she stated.
Dr. Myles said girls have stressors just like boys and men and sometimes that spills over into sports. Just like with boys and men.
“And so we have to talk about conflict resolution. We have to talk about anger,” she said.
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The Spalding players insist they didn’t want to fight and only wanted to play basketball.
“People look at us badly as if we did something. But they were the ones who started everything,” the player said.
That’s their version of what happened. We haven’t heard from the Wayne County players and Wayne County Schools didn’t return Jones’ call.
Spalding County Schools says it is investigating this incident.
The Georgia High School Association’s Executive Director called what happened “egregious” and said this won’t happen without consequences.
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