S.F.'s Lowell High baseball must forfeit key games, lose entire coaching staff after racial incident

Lowell High School‘s championship varsity baseball team will be forced to forfeit three future games against city rivals while its entire coaching staff has been removed, district officials announced Monday while releasing the results of investigations into a racially charged incident last spring. 

“The school will find an interim coach for this season and conduct a search for a permanent coach for next season,” officials said.

School administrators advised Lowell baseball parents and players of the decisions in a virtual meeting scheduled for early evening.

“We want to emphasize that there is no place for racism, discrimination, or racialized harm in the Lowell community or anywhere in SFUSD,” district officials said in a statement obtained by the Chronicle prior to the meeting. “We encourage anyone who has experienced or witnessed racialized harm that has gone unaddressed to report it to school officials so that concerns can be appropriately addressed.”

While the officials did not release specific information about the investigation, sources inside the Lowell community told the Chronicle in May that it appeared to be connected to alleged race-based taunting by Lowell’s varsity players during a junior varsity game against Lincoln High at which the varsity coaches were present.

The California Interscholastic Federation’s San Francisco section also investigated the incident and found Lowell varsity baseball violated the rules regarding unsportsmanlike conduct, resulting in the forfeits to Lincoln, Galileo and Washington high schools during this upcoming season.

“The forfeited games were chosen based on the standings last season and the impact it will have on standings in the 2026-2027 season,” said section commissioner Gail Barkslaw in an Aug. 28 letter to Lowell administrators and athletic staff.

The statewide organization also will require staff and players connected to the junior varsity and varsity teams to complete a sportsmanship course, which includes topics related to bullying, hazing, inappropriate behaviors and implicit bias.

The incident reportedly occurred during the final game of the baseball season for the junior varsity team. 

A few days later, Lowell’s varsity players won the San Francisco Section/Academic Athletic Association championship against Lincoln High at Oracle Park, sending them to the CIF Northern California playoffs in June. Lowell then lost in the first round to the Central Valley’s Immanuel High School.

The team’s three coaches were suspended shortly after that loss as the allegations of the racial incident spread among parents and school officials.

Varsity head coach Michael Sera, who is also a physical education instructor at the school, was placed on leave from his teaching role as well, district officials said. He declined to comment following the May incident.

It was Sera’s first year as head coach, and he is just the school’s third to hold that position in 44 years. He had been a junior varsity coach at the school for the past 15 years and is a 2011 Lowell graduate.

Parents of the school’s baseball players said the former coaches continued to teach physical education at Lowell.

It remained unclear whether any Lowell players faced disciplinary actions. District officials said privacy laws prevented them from sharing additional information about the incident or anyone involved, but said in a statement to the Chronicle that “accountability” was part of the support system provided to the team’s student athletes.

“Immediately after the initial report of the incident, Lowell administration were in direct communication with the impacted students, their family, and the Lincoln team to ensure that they worked to repair any harm done,” district officials said in the statement Monday. “Lowell Varsity players engaged in relearning of the (official) code of conduct, met and discussed the importance of being upstanders when bullying and harassment is witnessed, and individual players took accountability for their individual actions.”

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This article originally published at S.F.’s Lowell High baseball must forfeit key games, lose entire coaching staff after racial incident.