“Sport should be our safe haven”; Primetime 585 co-founder reacts after coach is shot at youth soccer game

ROCHESTER, NY — The Rochester sports community is responding to the shooting at a youth soccer game in Buffalo. The coach of the Rochester team was shot twice and is recovering.

Karen Iglesia, co-founder of Primetime585, an organization that aims to help athletes in the Rochester area create positive change, said sports should be a safe haven.

“It’s unbelievable. Sporting events are supposed to be our safe haven. This is where our children should feel protected. And this is what happened, especially outside the city. They were separated from their parents and the parents are trying to find their children,” Iglesia said.

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The Flower City Panthers, made up of kids from many local school districts, were playing. Iglesia knows many of the kids and parents who were at Sunday’s game. She says shootings have no place on the field and describes a Facebook Live from the time the shooting occurred.

“You see people running and you hear a child screaming, ‘Where is my father?’ and the phone falls. You can see the fear,” Iglesia said. “Then the shooting. You can hear it in the background, the gunshots, you can hear everything.”

Iglesia says this shooting is traumatic for the young players, coaches and family members.

“They need psychological counseling. They have witnessed their coach go through traumatic experiences and these children will also go through traumatic experiences,” she said.

She is convinced that this will have a lasting impact on these children.

“Some of these kids are scared. Some say, ‘I don’t want to play football anymore.’ It’s a sport. That’s how they let out all their fears. That’s what’s supposed to be protected, and when I heard that, it broke me,” Iglesia said.

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