Following a thrilling 13-10 victory by the Michigan Wolverines over their longtime rivals, the Ohio State Buckeyes, a brawl broke out between the two teams, leading to police intervention. The Michigan players, in a celebratory moment, were seen carrying a school flag at midfield when Buckeyes defensive end Jack Sawyer tore the flag away, sparking the altercation. In a video circulating online, players from both teams can be seen pushing and throwing punches as police officers attempted to restore order, resorting to the use of pepper spray to disperse the crowd.
The Ohio State University Police Department later confirmed that officers from both Ohio and Michigan used pepper spray during the altercation. The incident was deemed as detrimental to the spirit of college football by onlookers, with one observer stating, “It’s bad for the sport, bad for college football. But at the end of the day, some people, they gotta learn how to lose, man. You can’t be fighting and stuff just because you lost a game, you know. All that fighting ― we have 60 minutes, we have four quarters to do all that fighting.”