A black high school wrestler with dreadlocks was forced to make a choice: cut his hair or forfeit his match.
He was told by a referee that his hair and the hair cover he was wearing violated wrestling rules during a competition Thursday in southern New Jersey.
Andrew Johnson wanted to compete. So he stood, forlorn and resigned, as he received a hurried, last-minute haircut while teammates from Buena Regional High School shouted their support. With his dreadlocks shorn, Johnson went on to win his match.
A local reporter captured the scene on video and shared it. As the reporter saw it, Johnson’s decision made him the ultimate team player.
But as the video gained widespread attention Friday, many viewers saw something else: a white official forcing a black teenager to surrender a part of his identity.
And as the video spread, another issue came to light. The referee who spoke to Johnson, Alan Maloney, had been accused in 2016 of using a racial slur against a black referee at a social gathering of New Jersey wrestling officials. Maloney was suspended, but the suspension was overturned after an appeals process and he was allowed to continue officiating.
Critics pointed to the past episode in accusing Maloney of racial bias in his response to Johnson’s hair.
On Friday, the New Jersey State Interscholastic Athletic Association, which oversees high school sports, said in a statement that it would review the matter and that it had provided information to the New Jersey Division on Civil Rights.
Wrestler Andrew Johnson after winning his match. Source: AAP
The group also said that the New Jersey Wrestling Officials Association should not allow Maloney to continue officiating until an investigation had been completed to “avoid potential distractions for the competing wrestlers.”
In a statement Friday afternoon, the Buena Regional School District said that Maloney would “no longer be permitted to officiate any contests” that involved Buena students.
Maloney did not respond to phone or email messages. Neither did several officials from the southern chapter of the New Jersey Wrestling Officials Association, of which Maloney is a member.
Johnson could also not be reached for comment. One of his parents met with school district officials to discuss the incident, the school district said in its statement.
Ron Roberts, another wrestling referee and a member of the same chapter, said that he had spoken to Maloney on Friday about what had happened and that Maloney was “just upset about the situation,” which he believed had been taken out of context.
The New Jersey State Interscholastic Athletic Association, in its statement, said that it was reviewing whether Johnson violated rules by the National Federation of State High School Associations on wrestlers’ hair.
Roy Dragon, who is in charge of interpreting the rules for the state wrestling officials association, declined to comment.
According to the federation’s rulebook, wrestlers’ hair must not fall below the back of a shirt collar, the earlobes or eyebrows.
Wrestlers with long hair are allowed to wear a hair covering that has to be “made of solid material and nonabrasive.”
Roberts, a graduate of Buena High School who has been a wrestling official for more than 20 years, said that he visited the team last week to review the rules.
When he was there, he said, he told Johnson and another student with long hair that they would need proper hair coverings to compete.
“I told them in front of the coach,” he said. “So the awareness of the hair was brought up by myself last week.”
After the meeting, Johnson competed in the team’s first match of the season without incident. George Maxwell, the Buena wrestling coach, and the school’s athletic director, David Albertson, did not respond to requests for comment.
Roberts said that usually, before the competitions begin, there are “pre-meet” discussions between officials, coaches and wrestlers on issues like uniforms, hair, facial hair or fingernails. He did not know whether this had occurred Thursday night with Johnson.
If those violations have not been addressed by the time the wrestlers have reached the competition mat, Roberts said, athletes have 90 seconds to correct the problem.
In a situation similar to the one involving Johnson, wrestlers would have three options, Roberts said: put on an appropriate hair cover, forfeit or get an approved haircut.
Roberts said that in his two decades of officiating, hair-related violations were uncommon.
The reporter who initially shared video of the incident, Mike Frankel, sent a tweet Friday seeking to add more context. He said Johnson’s coaches had argued with Maloney for several minutes, but when the referee started the time clock, Johnson agreed to have his hair cut.
The wrestler then took to the mat where he defeated his opponent in overtime. Buena won the meet.
