Parents defend Knoch girls wrestling coach Logan Downes after firing: ‘This is a mistake’
Parents of Knoch girls wrestlers object to the school district’s firing of its coach for what they believe was misinterpretation of contact with female athletes following a December tournament.
Knoch School District confirmed Logan Downes, who has coached the team the past two years, was fired from his position Tuesday, Jan. 6. District officials declined to comment.
Parents of team members, including some of the girls involved in the alleged incidents, are frustrated with the decision and what they perceive as a lack of transparency.
They noted the firing happened weeks after an incident at a wrestling tournament in which he appears to have given a couple of wrestlers on his team taps on the buttocks after they won their bouts.
“I’m always there. I’m the team mom, per se. I’m there from when they walk through the doors to the time they leave,” said parent Ashly Glover. “It was nothing more than a celebratory tap.”
“We’ve known him for a long time. It’s not a new thing. Coaches all over the sport, all over the world do it. It’s not an inappropriate gesture,” she said.
The Knights were competing in the Dog House Rumble girls wrestling tournament at Redbank Valley High School in Clarion County on Dec. 13.
Parents say a Hudl livestream of the tournament’s final hour shows the incidents and they said they believe this video was used as a pretense for disciplining Downes. They believe the taps were “celebratory” in nature.
The Butler Eagle reviewed the video in question.
Between 10:20 and 10:42 minutes in the video, Downes appears to congratulate a Knights wrestler after she won a bout with a tap on her buttocks twice. He appears to do similar at around 36:13 minutes into the video with another wrestler who came over to talk to him. There is one final interaction around the 40-minute mark after a Knoch wrestler lost her bout, where Downes appears to pat her on the head and shoulder in consolation.
Parent and booster club secretary Tiffany Greiner and her husband, Mark, took issue with the school not having any communication with their daughter, despite being a part of one of the incidents. They worry about hurting Downes’ reputation through what they describe as a “messy” and “lazy” process.
“We love Knoch and believe in the wrestling program,” Mark Greiner said. “It’s flourished the past several years. Logan has been a big part of that. Our daughter didn’t even know it happened until we showed her the video.”
Several parents, including Greiner, who spoke with the Eagle said the school district did not speak to any of the girls involved before making a decision.
“My daughter was one of the girls in the video. I was never contacted by the school,” Tiffany Greiner said.
She said she heard other moms were contacted Dec. 17, which is when Downes was informed by Josh Shoop, Knoch’s athletic director, he had been suspended.
Parents said several of the moms went to the school Monday, Jan. 5, to ask Shoop for answers.
Shoop confirmed to the Eagle Tuesday afternoon Downes had been fired earlier that day.
“We wanted to defend Logan because they removed him from the coaching staff. Our girls had been thriving. We have a state finalist. We have other girls with potential, going to these tournaments, placing as individuals and a team despite low numbers,” Tiffany Greiner said.
Glover said the interaction with her daughter came after she finished in third place at the tournament. She was vying to make the championship bout, lost a match, then had to work her way through consolation rounds to get to third place.
Pumped up and excited after she won third, the first person she celebrated with was Downes, Glover said.
“Since then, I’ve whole-heartedly disagreed with how the district has handled this,” Glover said. “They’re making a huge mistake. They’re not looking at context. They’re looking at a video and seeing red.
“They’re making a call on a few-second-long video.”
Several parents said the congratulatory contact, such as butt taps, is not uncommon in boys wrestling and other sports.
“This was within the realm of the athletic world,” Tiffany Greiner said.
Downes was employed by Knoch’s wrestling boosters, not the school district, because the team is considered a club sport. He had to receive routine clearances and be approved by the school board to be the coach for the girls wrestling team.
The Knights’ Braylee Ireland won a WPIAL title and the program’s first PIAA medal last year under Downes’ leadership.
Tiffany Greiner said she believes somebody outside of Knoch School District brought it to the school district’s attention.
Mark Greiner said two days after the Redbank tournament, the boosters had an emergency meeting where a discussion was held on a video of the coach “being inappropriate with the girls.” He said they took a look at it, but he was told by his wife, Tiffany, that the boosters didn’t see anything they felt was wrong.
“For the school to do that so quickly without, what we feel, was any due process, and, of course, the girls don’t want to lose their coach, too,” Mark Greiner said. “The guy does a phenomenal job of coaching.”
“The touch was a tap, in my opinion. They’d probably have to fire a lot of people if they were going to go that route,” he added.
Mark Greiner said he will attend the next school board meeting Jan. 14, and that his daughter will speak out to defend Downes.
“We’re going to say, ‘Hey, this is a mistake. It wasn’t correctly carried out,’” Mark Greiner said.
Downes could not be reached for comment.
