Two high school students in Texas were kicked off their football team on Friday night after they demonstrated during the national anthem to protest racial inequality.

One student, Cedric Ingram-Lewis, 16, raised a fist in the air while the anthem played. The other, Larry McCullough, 18, got down on one knee. In response, their coach told them to hand over their uniforms, The Houston Chronicle reported.

“We had to get our message across: End racial injustice and the oppression of black people,” Mr. Ingram-Lewis said in a phone interview on Sunday.

The coach, Ronnie Mitchem, is the pastor at Victory and Praise Worship Center in Crosby, Tex., and a Marine Corps veteran. In a phone interview on Sunday, he said the teenagers’ demonstration was offensive to people who served in the military.