‘Unsportsmanlike’ flag planting causes chaos over college football rivalry weekend

Question

Rivalry weekend in college football saw multiple brawls triggered by postgame flag-planting celebrations. Michigan's victory over Ohio State led to a midfield fight involving pepper spray, while Florida’s win over Florida State sparked scuffles, prompting an apology from Florida's coach. NC State’s attempt to plant a flag after beating UNC resulted in confrontations, and Arizona State’s trident-planting celebration after a dominant win over Arizona caused brief scrapping. Coaches and players criticized these actions as disrespectful and unsportsmanlike, overshadowing the games themselves.

Comments

First and foremost I thought this was a great piece and a great source to use for the article regarding the celebrations of college football teams and their over celebrating on the field causing brawls over "flag-planting". I really liked the examples used, and Michigan and Ohio's brawl serves as a catalyst for how college sports is and how things simply need to change as a loss during season doesn't give one team over the other the right to physically attack just because of a result.

Answer 1

This is true. There is a lot of information on this on socials (eg Sportscenter's twitter) as well as from several reputable sources that corroborate what your CNN article states. ESPN, The Athletic (of the NYT), the Washington Street Journal, CBS, and NBC all have written articles related to flag-planting and fighting after rivalry games this weekend, particularly to the Michigan Ohio State post-game happenings.

Just for clarification, the pepper spray came from OSU's police, not the players or team staff. The NC skirmish most likely sprouted from heightened emotions due to the fact that this was their head coach's last game. Another similar act that didn't get as far was between Texas and Texas A&M, but Texas' coach stopped his players before the flag was planted. Some coaches did speak out against their teams' actions, including Florida's coach who did indeed apologize to reporters and called the act of flag-planting "embarrassing" (ESPN).

https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/5959315/2024/11/30/college-football-flag-planting-rivalry-weekend/

https://www.espn.com/college-football/story/_/id/42709574/billy-napier-calls-florida-flag-planting-fsu-logo-embarrassing