Morgan Park football families protest after change in coaches

And families of football players at Morgan Park are planning a protest this morning after several of the team's coaches were seemingly let go. Yeah, the principal tells families the head coach had planned to leave for another position. And joining us now is Ashley Brand. Her brother is one of the coaches on that team. She claims was let go as well. Ashley, good morning to you. This is Kalia, Coach Chris James' sister. Oh, okay. Next to me is Ashley Bland. Hey, I'm Ashley. I am Coach Vino's wide receiver coach sister as well. Okay, I want to talk to you then about your brother who was the head football coach, Chris James. Tell me what happened here that he was let go because obviously a lot of families are upset about this. A lot of parents we've heard from online saying their kids can't access the portal to be able to see their highlight reels. What are the circumstances? of this departure. This was, this came out of nowhere, we were blindsided by this, the coaching staff as well as the players, this happened abruptly by the principal and the administrators of Morgan Park, Coach CJ did not resign at all, he never made a statement, we do not know where the principal nor the administrator got that from, but he did not resign, none of his coaching staff did, this was clearly a rumor or something that he got and he used that and he ran with it. And fired the whole coaching staff and shut down the football season. Yeah, the odd thing about, I wanna talk to the wife, the other woman there. And there, you know, the The odd thing about this is that it's like a he said, he said. So at the end of the day, the children- Go ahead, go ahead, Ashley. The children, at the end of the day, they are the ones that are, you know, taking the blunt force of this. Like, they still have games to play. They still have film that they need. Still receptions, touchdowns. It's colleges that are still looking at them. So, it's like, to take that away from these children and work hard all summer long, all season long, they've earned this. They've earned it. And for him just to take that away, we just have to look at the children at this aspect. Like, you don't do that to children. And this is a platform that they can get to college on. You just don't take that away from them. So I just, I feel sorry for the children for sure. It's so puzzling because the school was having an exceptional season. Right. So was there something going on behind the scenes that people were not aware of? Was there friction? There's been many challenges with CPS. This is just something that is coming to light. Some of the challenges that the football and other sports deal with. There was some friction, but it was nothing that That big to make them fire the whole staff abruptly and just end the season and pull these boys from the state prep bowl playoffs. Tell us, I do want to point out this fact, and then I want you to respond to what that does to a student athlete when they're pulled out at this juncture in the season. But I do want to point out the fact that the principal, Dan Kuzma, says the coach was leaving for another job. The coach says he never accepted one and he never resigned. And obviously, now the players are caught in the middle. Respond to the fact of what happens when a team is yanked away from being able to continue playing this late in a season like this. The boys are devastated. They have taken away opportunities, recruitment opportunities for them, scholarships. These boys had a chance to continue to play, to showcase their talent more. So much was taken from their recruitment. So this has devastated the boys. I myself spoke with some of the boys yesterday. They are hurt. They are devastated. They feel defeated to not have the backing of their principal and their administrators in their school and to just Taking their opportunity to play away from them. They are truly hurt. I'm so hurt for the boys and for the staff and the parents as well, their fans. Everybody is so devastated. So this is just not about the boys. Everyone is hurt and devastated. And we honestly cannot believe this is happening. Either of you can answer this? Are you looking to take legal action at this point? Currently right now we're not sure if we're going to take legal action or what the coaching staff is going to do. Right now our focus is the boys. That's the main thing. That's what all this is about is being behind the boys. So right now legally we have no comment about that, but right now we just want to show the boys that we stand in solidarity with them. We're behind them. We think that this is unfair and they deserve this opportunity to continue to play. They earned it. We just want them to play. Can we play Saturday, or Friday, if we win, can we play the King versus Kenwood game? That'll be a huge game. Everybody from Morgan Park knows that'll be a huge game. And then we deserve to play whoever we play for this prep bowl. So it's like, can we just play? I think that's what we need to know. Ashley, I think it's worth noting here that Morgan Park High School, in terms of the football team, has an exceptional football program there. And a lot of the students go on to some really big schools. Can you speak to that, about where some of those players end up? And maybe by snatching the season like this, they may not have that opportunity. Exactly. Every year, this staff sends multiple boys to D1 schools. Chris Durr, Nazir Rankin, just for example, of a few of the boys who are playing at D1 schools, who have multimillion-dollar NIL deals, they got those opportunities. They started here at Morgan Park under this coaching staff. So a lot of those boys were hoping to have those same opportunities, and that has been stripped and taken away from them. So that's the most devastating thing of them all, the missed opportunities. So this is why this is such a big thing. Because. Those opportunities have been taken away from them. Scholarships, recruits, everything has been taken from them. Well, I know there's a planned walkout by students there at 1045. I know a lot of parents are going to show up there as well. I do want to point out the fact that we, as a TV station, Fox 32 Chicago, we reached out to the principal. We reached out to CPS. So far, we have not gotten a response. Kalia and also Ashley, we appreciate both of you for standing in solidarity on behalf of those students. Thank you so much for your time this morning. Thank you. That does not make, can I just say, that does not make any sense at all. I mean, I understand they said, they said there was friction with the coaching staff. Okay. Well then someone else, exactly. But why punish all of those kids when scholarships are on the line? Yeah. I don't know why you would do it. Hopefully we get some answers and hopefully, like she said, they can play the remainder of those games. Absolutely, maybe by bringing light to this, things will change.