COVINGTON, Ky. — On Friday night, all anyone at Covington Catholic High School was talking about was that their star Colonels basketball team had unexpectedly lost to the rival St. Xavier Bombers, 55-45.

For the “Colonel Crazies,” as locals call them, identity is wrapped in state championship titles, and their all-male brotherhood.

But by Saturday afternoon, the Northern Kentucky school off the Dixie Highway had been ripped out of its overwhelmingly white, heavily Catholic, and largely Republican world and thrust into a national firestorm that touched seemingly every raw nerve in this polarized country — race, President Trump and the behavior of young white men.

Videos surfaced of dozens of Covington students in front of the Lincoln Memorial in Washington after the March for Life, chanting as they do at games, wearing “Make America Great Again” hats and appearing to be in a standoff with an elderly Native American man.