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Players Who Hit Ref Eligible to Return to High School Next Semester

Assistant coach Mack Breed, who ordered cheap shot, resigns.

The two John Jay High School football players who hit a referee during a September 4 game, under the orders of their assistant coach, will be eligible to return to their school for the spring semester in January.

ESPN is reporting that the decision was ruled upon during Wednesday's hearings held by the Northside Independent School District in San Antonio.

Assistant coach Mack Breed, however, resigned from his post at the school Thursday, one day after ESPN learned that he admitted to the school's principal that he ordered the hit on the ref.

On Thursday, Breed's attorney, James Reeves, told ESPN the incident is unfairly being blamed solely on his client.

"Some people are unfairly blaming one man, Mack Breed, for everything that happened at that game," Reeves said. "Mack Breed has spent three agonizing weeks contemplating his future since the fateful football game in which two players struck a referee. It has been a difficult road for Mack as he has stood silently watching the spectacle. He has replayed that game in his mind many times wondering how it all went wrong."

The two suspended players—17-year-old Michael Moreno and 15-year-old Victor Rojas—appeared on Good Morning America last Friday, saying that Breed ordered them to hit the ref, Robert Watts, after the official allegedly made racial slurs and unjust calls against them.

Watts, speaking through his attorney, denied allegations of making racial slurs, but the teen players insist he did.

Breed, speaking through his attorney, also insists Watts used racial slurs against his team.

"As a black male, nothing offended Mack Breed more than being called a racial epithet except someone in a position of authority calling his players racial epithets," Reeves said. "The slur was heard by multiple players, some of whom were not involved in the hit."

Since the incident, Rojas and Moreno have been attending an alternative school for which they'll be given credit for, before returning to John Jay when the new semester starts on January 15.

"Obviously the boys wanted to return to John Jay High School immediately, but we think this punishment is within the bounds of fairness, and the boys have accepted responsibility for their actions," the boys' attorney Jesse Hernandez told ESPN.

Watts can still decide to press criminal charges on the teenagers and their coach.

BET Sports News — Get the latest news and information about African-Americans in sports, including weekly recaps, celebrity news and photos of your favorite Black athletes.

(Photo: ABC)

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