Rootstown coach quits after superintendent overturns punishment for player who used racial slurs
Rovers head coach Troy Spiker kicked the player off the team for calling Black teammates the n-word.
By Ben Wolford and Michael Indriolo
Rootstown’s head football coach resigned this week after school officials overturned a disciplinary action against a white student who had at least three times used racial slurs, including the n-word, against teammates during practice.
Coach Troy Spiker was two games into his first season as head coach of the Rovers when he told Rootstown administrators he would be submitting his resignation. The Board of Education will meet in a special session at 6 p.m. Monday in the cafeteria to vote on whether to accept his resignation.
Spiker kicked the player off the team before last Friday’s game against Garfield after the player insulted another teammate, disparaging the origins of his last name, said Sparky Birkett, the father of one of the Black students who was targeted with the n-word.
This consequence did not last long. Over the weekend, Rootstown Superintendent Andrew Hawkins reversed Spiker’s disciplinary decision against the student, reinstating him to the team, according to two people with knowledge of the decision who asked not to be named.
Spiker did not return a phone call to a number listed for him, but he told a Record-Courier reporter this week that he felt the school administrators “took the legs out from underneath” him. “I stand by my decisions. I stand by my morals, my beliefs and I stand by what I’ve done,” he said.
Birkett, 45, of Alliance, has two children on the football team, both of whom are Black, and his primary concern has been for the safety of his kids. They have been overwhelmed by the stress and distraction of both the racist language leveled against them and the school’s decision to turn a blind eye.
“I don’t even know how they’re functioning,” Birkett said.
He said he asked his boys if they still want to be on the football team, and they said yes. They both played in Friday night’s game against Southeast.
“I told [Athletic Director] Keith [Waesch], we should not have to worry about the safety of our children while they are in school or on the football field, from their own teammate,” Birkett said. “I think Spiker deserves his job back. I think OHSAA [the Ohio High School Athletic Association] needs to be involved as well.”
No one in Rootstown school leadership has publicly taken responsibility for putting the player back on the team and reversing Spiker’s disciplinary action, instead issuing vague statements or failing to return requests for comment.
Hawkins did not return a phone call. Neither did Waesch.
School Board President Amanda Waesch, who is Keith’s wife, would not say who reversed Spiker’s decision to expel the player, but she insisted that the entire “board of five” should be consulted on decisions.
“I would think that, as the board president, I should have been aware of issues that needed to come before the board for decision making,” Amanda Waesch said. “I’m not saying this is an issue that the board needs to make a decision on. That’s not what I’m saying. But we’re a board of five, and we operate in public meetings. And I was not involved in this decision.”
She wouldn’t say whether she will accept Spiker’s resignation or whether she agreed with the decision to overrule his disciplinary action.
Board member Steven Vasbinder referred questions to Hawkins. The other board members, Eric Kline, Scott Krieger and Tom Siciliano, could not be reached for comment.
The events leading up to the student being kicked off the team stem from an incident that happened during an intrasquad scrimmage over the summer. Birkett’s son and another Black teammate got into an argument over a play.
The player who was kicked off the team said aloud, “I hate it when the n — do that,” Birkett said. Other players heard it, but coaches did not, and no action was taken.
At practice the following week, Birkett’s son and the player who used the n-word competed aggressively against each other, and the white student grabbed Birkett’s son’s facemask. Birkett’s son retaliated by shoving his hands off. After this tussle, Spiker shut down practice for the day. But the two continued to argue, and the white player asked Birkett’s son, “Do you know the definition of a n — ?” An assistant coach overheard their argument and intervened, though the white player would not admit to using the n-word, according to Birkett.
Following the confrontations of that day’s practice, both players were given equal suspensions. Birkett’s son received a suspension for “punching” the white player who grabbed his facemask.
On Aug. 29, Rootstown beat Crestwood, 20–14. But during practice the following week, the white player called another teammate, who is white, a “useless … piece of shit,” referencing the national origin of his last name. (The Portager is not providing information that could identify any of the students involved, apart from using Birkett’s surname, with his consent.)
Following this comment, Spiker took action. An assistant coach confirmed “100 percent,” Birkett said, that the player had used an ethnic insult against a teammate, and Spiker kicked the student off the team.
“To get these kids to understand that in our locker room at Rootstown, there’s one thing that we all have in common and that is that we wear Rootstown Rovers on our shirts,” Spiker told the Record-Courier. “We have many players that come from different backgrounds and different belief systems, different personal opinions and everyone has a right to those and ultimately all of those need to be respected and understood and appreciated, so we all can work together for the same common goal of being the most competitive football team that we can within our own locker room wearing two colors, blue and white, and sharing one name, Rootstown Rovers.”
The Rovers lost big to Garfield that Friday, a 6–35 rout. They lost again tonight against Southeast, 26–6.
It’s not clear what happened last weekend, but by Monday, the white player was back on the team. By Wednesday, Spiker had quit what he called his “dream job.”
The parents of the student who used the racial slurs could not be reached at a phone number listed for them.
Birkett is frustrated by the secrecy surrounding the school’s decision. He believes administrators should be accountable for decisions they make that affect the well-being of students. His children are now forced to play on the same team with someone who doesn’t respect them because of the color of their skin, and the man who stood up for them was essentially forced out of his job for taking a principled stand.
As a Black man who had lived in Rootstown for decades, Birkett said he understands what his sons are experiencing.
“I felt like this all of my life living in that community,” he said. “I held my mouth shut so much. This isn’t the first of this type of issue. But I want it to be the last. They owe an explanation to my children and to those two other Black players and to the community.”
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