With the impending exit of Detroit City from NISA, there was every expectation that the last NISA matchup with rival Michigan Stars would be a big one. DCFC had nothing to play for in the final match of the season, as the club had long ago locked up the fall season championship. For the Stars, the match was a chance to move out of the seventh slot in the standings and not much more. Of course, when these two clubs play each other, it’s always much much more.

The match on Saturday was a fun one, featuring 5 goals, and ending in a Detroit City win on the road 3-2. It was the kind of match you’d want to see a rivalry ended with, honestly, with both clubs taking their best shots at each other. While the next step for DCFC seems to be locked in place, which would end the rivalry (on the field anyway) between these two clubs, the future for Stars is less certain, as George Juncaj, Michigan Stars owner, has flirted with the idea of his own move to USL, while also considering staying in NISA (according to reporting from First Team Podcast).

At the gate, before the match, the traveling DCFC fans were informed that no banners or smoke would be allowed into the stands. Fans of the club are known to travel well, including showing up in much further afield locations across the NISA match this year. For this match, around 100 fans made the trip to Romeo High School. Security at the gate were searching travelling fans for the banned items, even mentioning that this match’s search was stricter, due to previous incidents where DCFC managed to get past security with banned items, specifically smoke bombs.

According to Joseph Slowvack, who was at the match, George Juncaj “kicked someone out at halftime for saying ‘your club sucks.’” According to multiple fans present, the Stars’ owner was more aggressive at the end of the match. As the visiting fans exited the field, both sides were exchanging comments, “Juncaj was at the gate telling folks he was glad to never have to see us again and a few folks said ‘bye George’ and a few gave the finger.”

Stephanie Munier, who was around the exit gate at the time of this confrontation, noticed that “George had to be restrained multiple times” as it appeared that he wanted to physically confront the visiting fans. His actions stood out, because the tone of the crowd had felt like a normal match between the two clubs, and Stephanie turned on her cell phone’s camera to film the situation.

Here's the segment where she actually hits me. Can anyone confirm who this was? https://t.co/pQPSw9jVEw pic.twitter.com/mmXMqx1CHt
— Oh, her. THAT Stephanie. 😕🤔😁🍸 (@StephanieMun313) November 21, 2021

In the video which was posted on Twitter soon after, George Juncaj can be seen on the other side of a fence, being guided away by security. Multiple voices are heard yelling “we’re going” and then a woman enters the frame, wearing a purple vest and carrying a red shirt or jacket in her hand. As she notices the camera, she immediately steps toward Stephanie and swipes at the camera, knocking it from her hand onto the ground. When the camera is picked up, the woman has retreated behind the fence. Some have claimed on social media that the person who struck Munier was George Juncaj’s wife, as of this point, we cannot confirm that to be true. According to Munier, police arrived on the scene soon after the incident but did not get involved or even exit their vehicles.

As of Monday evening, the Stars’ organization has not responded to our request for a statement regarding the incident. NISA’s Steve Johnson gave limited insight on the situation. “It [the alleged incident after the match] was discussed today in calls. Not sure what we will have for public consumption. Stay tuned.” Johnson emphasized that the league wouldn’t have a knee jerk reaction to any situation, but was “conducting due diligence from multiple sources to determine what actually transpired.”

While the league has had a long-running approach of not interfering in the operations of its member clubs, it would certainly seem that the league cannot tolerate a club owner openly antagonizing fans, if that is what happened on Saturday evening. One step further, if the person in the video IS a member of the Juncaj family, as some have alleged, there is zero deniability of what happened, it’s on video. It is inexcusable for any NISA club to tolerate violence at its matches and the league must reckon with what the video shows. The league should publicly correct this issue quickly and aggressively.

As we gather more information on this story, we’ll add to this article.

- Dan Vaughn