The Colonials lost the meet 79-89 after the disqualification.

Mr. Miller took to twitter to say that his son wore the American flag on his swim cap to honor his grandfather who died on September 11. However, Miller stated that it was only after the race was completed, that the Parsippany Hills coach approached the official.

"The issue is the coach waited until after the swim to get the DQ, deciding to put the burden of a "loss" on a 16 year old, letting down all the Seniors that won their last dual meet of their HS careers," wrote the dad on Twitter.

According to the National Federation of State High School Associations Swimming and Diving, "one American flag, not to exceed 2 inches by 3 inches, may be worn or occupy space on each item of uniform apparel. By state association adoption, to allow for special occasions, commemorative or memorial patches, not to exceed 4 square inches, may be worn on the uniform without compromising its integrity."

Parsippany Hills addressed the controversy in an email to the school community where they denied the coach intended for the Morristown swimmer to be disqualified.

"Our coach never asked for any athletes or team to be disqualified. He (the coach) approached the official with a question about the swim cap to confirm that PHHS swimmers could also wear the American flags on them in the future," the letter stated.

"Our PHHS swim coach pointed out to the official that we had swim caps with an American Flag logo and we could not wear them. He asked the official if it was still a rule. The official came back and stated that the logo on the Morristown swimmer's cap was too large and disqualified the Morristown relay team," the letter continued. 

The Parsippany school district stated that "it wasn't the intent to disqualify any athlete and that he (the PHHS coach) only wanted to know if it was still a rule. Our coach also offered to disqualify our relay team, but the official stated that he could not because there was no rule violation."

TAPinto reached out to the Morristown High School Athletic Director and the MHS Swim Coach, but neither responded,

"Thanks very much for the support on my son's swimming DQ. Tough rule with a harsh penalty but we'll learn from this. My son wishes no ill will on the opposing team and just wants everyone to get back to swimming. Hopefully the spirit of this rule can be changed in the future." Mr Miller wrote in another tweet.