It's common practice for fans to dress up in crazy costumes in an attempt to distract basketball players during a game, but some are claiming that a few kids at an Atlantic County, N.J., high school basketball game may have taken the act too far.
According to NBC 10 Philadelphia, two students from Holy Spirit High School in New Jersey dressed as a banana and a monkey in an attempt to distract players from the predominantly black Atlantic City High School team during a tournament last week.
"I absolutely think it was offensive," Ricardo Belgrave told the news station. "You should know when you're putting that costume on, it should come in your mind that this might offend African-American people."
Other costumes included students dressed as a bumblebee and a cowgirl, according to the news station, and not everyone saw the costumes as a problem.
"To me it was harmless kids' pranks, you know. I didn't see any racial overtones to anything," Jack Versput told NBC 10.
The Cape Atlantic League's board of referees told NBC 10, "The behavior was not appropriate and the game's referees were reprimanded."
The news station notes that the students who dressed as a monkey and banana would not be punished but were warned that "similar actions would not be tolerated."
Read more at NBC 10 Philadelphia.