The entire thing was a no-win. =(

kind of like this thread

The only school that has a tape is Covenant as far as we know. I'm with you on the football deal. There's a point where you simply have to score in football, or lay down. Now if Kramer's team was constantly tossing bombs, I might feel a bit different. But god, don't let us get distracted on football here.

The point here is that if you believe the Dallas coach, his team supposedly only got off 7 shots since the other team was pressing. That coach is not being a bitch about it, so I sorta believe him. If that's true, and they were only allowed 7 shots, that tells me the other team was playing very aggressive D that they normally wouldn't play if they were simply "playing to win".

Same with the football game your describing. If the other team was fumbling or lobbing interceptions or going 3 and out, it's one thing. But if the opposing team was full-on blitzing every play, I might feel a bit different because you know that while not everyone plays pure "prevent" to protect a lead, they certainly don't bring the whole backfield every play.

Also, as horrible as 91-0 sounds, football is different, shut-outs commonly happen. I honestly don't think I have ever heard of a shut-out in basketball - even 3rd graders manage to get 1-2 baskets. That alone tells me the Covenant team was WAAAY up Dallas' ass on D, which is uncalled for.

Actually, I think the email is about nothing but himself and he uses the girls as a shield.

Also, notice that on one hand he says "we didn't run up the score" and on the other he says, "we played the game as it was meant to be played."

Well, what does that mean? Either you ran the score up because you were doing your best, or you didn't run the score up... right? Or something like that.

The fact is they shut the other team out. That's freaking unheard of. I mean, if you are playing a reasonable perimeter zone the other team is going to get lucky and drain a long shot. That right there is proof they played a very aggressive game. If the score was 143 to 12, I would have less questions, but 100-0 is a simple, flagrant piss-on.

I think that's what pisses me off so much about this. It's not that I'm Mr. Compassion. It's the dishonesty of the whole thing. I mean fuck it. Why not just say, "We're the baddest mother fuckers on the planet." And move on. It's all the lying and lameness of triyng to justify the score that goads me.

You know, when someone takes there gear off in Arena or does a /dance or whatever - they are at man/woman enough to say, "I'm cool and you suck dick." I can at least RESPECT that. But, if they were to say "oh, I was working on macros and that happened on accident", I would pray for them to die in their sleep.

Something like this happened last year where a single football player scored 100 points or something like that. The coach basically said, "I wanted him to set the record and it seemed like a good idea at the time." Some people still bitched, but at least he was honest.

God, why do I care? I've claimed to exhaust myself each time I post, and I'll do it again here, but people keep taking new angles that are easily shot down.

Orme, you may be right. The coach may have been sticking up for the girls to get parental support in order to save his job. We can never know his motivations. It doesn't change the fact that the end result was the Administration saying some pretty damning things about what occurred without protecting their students from any backlash their words might have and this coach standing up for them.

Fair enough, but I feel the girls and parents are just as much to blame. This is typical mob mentality. I must resist the urge to insert a Nazi metaphor

I wasn't actually trying to relate it to your scenario, but to that of these girls. They're in a school with only 20 students, and they have only 8 members on their team. They haven't won a game in 4 years. Covenant was a vastly superior team. The differences between the two were similar to that of a WNBA team playing against Covenant. Would the WNBA team play like these girls did, and humiliate their opponent? Or would they play for fun once they realized how huge a difference there would be in the level of skill?

I can almost guarantee that, as a Christian school, there are clauses in the contracts regarding ethics and morals. As a private school, there are very likely rules regarding instructor conduct and media situations. Either way, I'm sure they're covered.

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I dunno, I mean...WNBA....they might not be on the winning side.

Late response(earlier post was only in response to Uluth's):



They WOULD widen the score if it was a safe thing to do, no question. If they thought there was some RISK to trying to widen the score, they would try and stall, no question. And that's what's in question here: Playing your best, doing your best - particularly with regard to the current situation. If there's a safe opportunity to widen the gap, you take it. Teams don't usually do that with really hard teams because of the risk involved.

So, in answer to your point, they *WOULD* do that against the best team if their defense was weak, or an opportunity presented itself. As was the case in this particular patch, I think we can rest assured the defense was pretty weak.

In short, low defense + high scoring = greater assurance of victory, and implies playing to the best of your ability given the situation. Scoring 20+ points ahead and then stalling before a tough team solidifies their defense(and offense) also = greater assurance of victory, and they're also playing to the best of their ability.



Ironic coming from you =) Maybe you should go back to the "I think it is cowardly after the fact to try to prosecute people" thread and play semantics some more.



Will answer this in conjunction with your more recent post because they make the same point.

Basically what I said above: It's ONLY the right strategy if there's a danger of losing control somehow, i.e. the other teams solidifies themselves and has room for a comeback. If it takes them LONGER to regroup, then you DO take advantage of that if you're playing smart and even when the team is tough. If you can get a 30-point lead over a 20-point lead safely, there's reason not to. That means that even if they end up solidifying themselves, it's going to take that much longer to mount a comeback.

It was sort of touched on a little bit by other posters, but one of the differences is obviously a time game. The game is still going to last X amount of time, unlike with the /dancing arena.

What I'm saying is, the bball players are doing JUST as much of a beeline to victory as the 2300-1500 matchup that takes 5 seconds, it's just a question of how long it takes in basketball.

But for the sake of argument let's say the good arena team manages to do a /dance and maybe a /spit on the opposing team, and STILL kills them in only 5 seconds. The difference here is twofold - the specific intent to mock and belittle, AND the fact that neither of those actions are components of the game itself.

A better analogy for scoring additional baskets would be something akin to a warrior executing for 15k at the precise moment(assuming he doesn't slow the battle down by building the rage bar). Unnecessary to win, but assures victory and is certainly part of the game's mechanics(exploits aside, of course).

Or better yet burning down one character in a 2v2 match as QUICKLY as humanly possible with all manner of focus fire when it wasn't necessary. Is it adding insult to injury when you decide to do 4k dps to the target instead of relaxing a bit and doing 2k? Again, you'd have to explain what was specifically wrong with it.

I'm going to agree with what Orme said earlier: I think the saddest thing about all this is that there are actually people that are willing to defend this guy.

The problem is, Venen, that they didn't even DO what you said. They stopped at 100 and only scored 12 in the final period. They played to EXACTLY 100. They didn't try and make more baskets, as you claim would have been the right thing to do. They stopped. That means they were making a precise point by controlling the score to a preset number someone determined somewhere in the game.

So all of this "They should play their best every second" garbage is just that, garbage. They didn't. They stopped at a preset score.

That fact invalidates any point of "They weren't mocking them."

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There is no such thing as right or wrong; only pleasure and pain.

And I think it's sad that people jumped all over his ass. And sad that people aren't coming down on the school more rather than the convenient scapegoat of the coach.

I don't see it that way at all. The girls and their parents probably chose that private school for the basketball program but it was the Administration who hired this coach. Once you've entered high school and are looking for a collegiate career your coach owns you. You do what he says or you screw your chances at a scholarship, or even a preferred walk-on position at a decent college. There is no mob mentality involved. Coach says he wants 100 points to consider this a win and they comply. Unless there was showboating, which nobody has contended, they were just doing as the man ordered them to do. You may not like it, they may not have liked it, but I fail to see how the girls can be blamed.
I've seen HS football coaches sit a senior for a game where the kid and the coach knew recruiters had come to specifically take a look at that kid because the coach disliked him. If you haven't been in their shoes you don't get how seriously a coach has control of their future.
The Administration of the school seems to have written these girls off in order to save the reputation of the school. That is inexcusable. THEY hired the coach & kept him for 4 years. I find it hard to believe that he hadn't shown this kind of cutthroat attitude before this game.

Why would the school in general be responsible for running up the score? Were the principal or other school leaders at the game? Were they instructing the coach to blow the other team out of the water? If not, why would anyone need to come down on the school for this?

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For basically throwing the girls under the bus to make themselves and their "Christian values" look good?

Okay, so let's make Bovinity the principal of the school. It's a Christian school. You're teaching what you hope is Christian behavior as part of the curriculum. This 100-0 game occurs, and you and the other administrators feel that the manner in which it played out was not in keeping with the values you're trying to instill.

How do you publicly apologize for it? What would you have said differently? I don't think there's a whole lot you can change. They don't mention the students. They don't even mention the coach. They mention their values and that they feel it was "shameful" and embarrassing. Simple. They are stating the plain fact that the outcome of the game was not in keeping with the values they're trying to teach. It doesn't matter that you don't agree with those values. Ignore that for a moment. Focus instead on how they got the message across. What is it about the message itself that you dislike? What would you have changed?

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It IS rather simple.

You don’t release a public statement saying that anyone who works for you did anything shameful and embarrassing. Instead, you say something to the effect that the score was regrettable, that you are taking looking at your program internally. You say that as a very successful program, you will strive harder to set an example of sportsmanship that is consistent with the values of the Christian school system.

Then, you proceed to rip the coach a new ass, in private, and do as much damage control as possible.

And you ESPECIALLY don't say/imply that STUDENTS did something shameful, embarassing and not-christian-like. Jeez.

But they did. If they and their coach didn't run up the score, who did?

As a side note, it's crazy to me that Tyral and I are on the same side here. That's like... never happened on any topic ever. His posts are spot on.

I know! And I agreed with Joxur! It's like topsy-turvey world!

This surprises me, coming from you. You're a teacher, would you seriously get behind the public calling-out of your students like that over something like this?

Has anyone looked at the scores from other DA games? They have not topped 10 points any any of their posted games this year. IMO they should not field a team, or at least a team that competes at that level because this won't end.

Yeah, but it's everyone elses' fault, Krby.

....right, Fribur?

Did all the other schools score 100 points? Did they press in the second half? I'm not going to rehash all that shit. There's a *reason* why it made news.



See the thing is, I read their apology, and I have no idea what you guys are getting all pissy about. I don't see it as "calling out" of their students at all. You're right though, I would not be happy with a public calling-out of students in general.

The same reason the girl that made 35,000 texts is all over the news?

...whatever that reason it, it certainly isn't importance or relevance.

(Actually, it probably made news because of the firing, not the score.)

Yep, I agree with that.

Both sides are wrong.

There is NO reason that school should field a basketball team. If they want to anyway, they should have released a rebuttal press release that said "Nope, we suck, we know we suck, we don't care that we suck, so please don't villify other teams for beating the snot out of us when we won't make the necessary adjustments to field a competitive team".

Even so, it's wrong to run it up like they did. Both institutions are stupid in this one.

Fribur, it is the lack of an exclusion of the girls that bugs me. THEIR coach, you know the one THEY hired, made all the decisions on that court, not the girls. By not excluding the girls they included them in many eyes.

I daresay it made the news because of the one thing that most in this thread have ignored: that the Dallas Academy is a school for the (I don't know what the PC term is these days) mentally challenged.

Completely subjective. 100 is certainly a significant 3-digit number, but it's a stretch to conclude they went for that number simply out of a desire for mocking the other team. Perhaps they stopped there because they viewed THAT number as their "50 points", and decided further was too much. Or perhaps, for their own purposes, they decided to utilize other methods simply to practice.

Assuming that was actually the case and it wasn't simply a matter of sheer happenstance that they didn't score more than 12 in the final period(25/25/25/12 wouldn't be unheard of, or even more varying numbers.. though I agree it looks obvious they went for 100), I'd completely agree that they weren't playing their best(or at least, up until that point). And it would be a shame that they decided to not give it their all at the end. If the coach should have been fired for anything, it should have been for stopping, regardless of whether the number was 100 or not.

Regardless of that Uluth, a lot of the criticism has been around the fact that he didn't stop pre-100. The fundamental disagreement is whether or not it's classy to go beyond a certain point and "give the other team a chance".

And again, very subjective. I can understand where the other side comes from on it, but it's not a situation where it's a universal truth that it's somehow nicer to go easy on the other side when it's a blowout.

Eh, I'm just seeing the school's side of this. I think they did the right thing by issuing an apology, though I can see how others feel it was a bit on the harsh side. I'm sure the players on their team would have been fine with stopping the press and just playing the game for fun once they pulled ahead by 40 or so points. While the letter never states outright that the girls should be embarrassed or shamed, it does kind of imply it. I think that was over the top.

But I've got no problem with them firing the coach. It wasn't his place to contradict the public statement, especially as he was responsible for the score in the first place. He should have been contrite, and instead of being defiant he should have taken the blame himself if he wanted to publicly excuse his players from any wrongdoing.

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Personally I took that into account in my comments. The question is whether or not they are capable of an extremely strong competitive backbone, and I would argue that MANY mentally challenged people are(naturally, it depends on the disorder). There are countless people without mental disorders that have no concept of competitiveness. Now, an 8-year-old mentally disabled kid is a stretch... but at high school age, many of them will have dealt with their disorders to a degree(not completely of course, but to a point) that they are able to subdue them enough to have that competitive spirit.

And of course the other way to look at this is that the other team saw that they were disabled, and didn't want to insult that handicap by going easy on them. That would be the ultimate sign of disrespect to any disabled person, especially in a competitive environment.

For that matter, do we even know if the other team wasn't actively just having fun with the entire thing? I haven't really seen any indication of the players' spirits during the game.

For all we know, the losing team might have been just goofing around and having a ball the entire time.



I dom agree with this, actually. I might respect him coming out and disagreeing with the school, but I also know that it's grounds for dismissal. I've no problem with the firing of the coach on this matter.

I realize my first post was probably too long and most didn't read all of it... but I stated that the coach was wrong for running up the score in the first place, and the school is wrong for firing the guy. The school is at fault for even making this a story/issue in the first place, to be honest.

If game ends 100-0 and the school doesn't say anything the next day... do we have this thread? Most likely no. They made it a story by stating that they wanted to initially forfeit the victory (which is laughable in team sports, unless there was some illegal wrongdoing- which, of course, there was none), continued to apologize when the other team really didn't care about the first apology (again they have bigger fish to fry, so to speak), and then escalating and overblowing the "story" with the firing of the coach because he did not apologize along with the school.

Coach is at fault. School is at fault. Sometimes you gotta know when to stop talking... school needs to learn that.

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To answer the previous question...

Regardless of talent level, regardless of sport, regardless of disparity of skill between two individuals/teams... I don't know of any individual/team that is losing as big as they were and decided to "goof around" or "joke around" while playing. Athletes are competitive by nature, and every athlete wants to do the best they can and win. And if you are down 59-0 at half time... you should not give up. You should continue to try, to do your best, even though you know the score and game is out of reach. And if you do resign yourself to defeat and give up... then you aren't laughing about it and making a joke out of it while you are still involved in the contest. After the game- yeah, /shrug it off, say we got embarassed, next time we will do some things different and hopefully the outcome is more in our favor.

But no, I don't know of any athlete who would just trivialize their play and make a mockery/joke of it while the contest was still going on...

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Maybe the coach should have a chat with the coach of this team:

I am moved by that video.

RUDY

RUDY

How long were the quarters?

My sons JV games are 6mins each. So if we take that into effect and say they also played 6 min each- what were the girls suppose to do?

!st quarter- balls out the 1st 3 mins... someone said 25 points in that time. That leaves 3 mins to score 5 more shots (total was 35). Not unheard of at all for a 1st quarter of a game.

2nd quarter- 6 mins for 24 points, if they were shooting 3 pointers, thats 8 shots or 12 shots for 2 pointers.

3rd quarter- 6 mins and 29 points, thats 10-15 shots (more than likely the starters were back in, out of pure habit on how they play normal games)

4th quarter- 6 mins for 12 points, prob 3 pointers... 4-6 shots? Thats 1 try per minute.

What were the girls suppose to do? try and miss a shot? You cant ask a kid to do that. Also- we have no idea how many were foul shots?? BUT we see no points for the other team- so they were playing very well, we can assume no fouls or very minimal fouls not leading to 1 on 1.

While the whole thing sucked for the girls who lost- thats part of sports. You can't ask the winning team to throw bricks all night. Like someone else said, 100 points on girls is impressive.

I cant see firing a guy- talk to him, talk to the district to move the other team, but fire a guy for doing his job, well damn.

No.

It's only impressive against an opponent that's up to par. Getting 100 points against a vastly inferior team isn't impressive. It's unnecessary.

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I highly doubt that a team that hadn't won a game in 4 years was made up of "serious athletes" and "competitive players".

Besides, we can't have it both ways. You can't on one hand talk about these poor, disadvantaged, abused special kids that got steamrolled by the mean power-players and on the other hand talk about serious, competitive athletes that certainly wouldn't take a game lightly.

The local sports radio station here in Dallas started talking about whether a basketball team from the radio station could beat the girls basketball team from Covenant back when this was in the news. Today, the athletic director from Covenant came on the radio and agreed to play a game, with the coach and administrators of the school signing off on it. It's supposed to happen 6 weeks from now.

Fellow P1

I hope none of the girls show up after what this school said about them.

lol ok