Oh dear. Expect more "that's not FAIR" whining. Remember the dude that lost his coachin job last year because he won with too high a score?
Sure do. I think Lee HS should be commended for not quiting and playing the entire game. When you're good, you're good. With how soft this country has become I think I'm becoming a strong advocate of teams running the score if they can.
no. there is a complete difference between pressing and trying to score as much as they could (like they did) and passing the ball around to milk the clock and eventually shooting while still playing... being on both sides of blowouts in highschool basketball, no one needs to be kicked it the face after the end has already been decided. its not like they had to intentionally keep the game close, but they didnt need to obliterate the other team by 135 points. What really is the point of highschool athletics? when you ask that question, I think the fact that what the coach allowed to happen was pretty ridiculous. do i think he needs to be fired? no, but he definitely can be labeled ****** the fact that they are in the running for a national championship changes things somewhat, but even when our rival highschool played Oak Hill (one of the best teams in the nation with a handful of future NBA players) they would stop dunking on every fastbreak after the initial slaughter.
I should have included the with my post. I was speaking tounge-in-cheek. You're right, as a coach, you are an educator. Being so means, you have a responsibility to build character in your kids as well as teach them to be responsible and have compassion. They should have been playing the 2nd and 3rd string players by the 2nd quarter.
a while back there was a story where the coach of a girls basketball team (i think, i barely remember the story) resigned because he ran up the score of a game where they wound up winning by an insane margin. now i'm sorry, but in the nba, ok, they're all grown men, plus people pay to see the games, so it's a good time, especially if you're team's the one on top, but in a high school game? NO WAY, that's unacceptable. i'm surprised, because in a lot of states, there are mercy rules that will stop the game once the score gets to some point. i say this coach should resign, imo.
I was reading the paper today and a local high school game was 48-3 at half time. Cmon your team is better take your foot off the accelerator a little please and give the other team some dignity.
I agree that this coach hasn't shown good judgment for many of the reasons above. I'll add one more. All it takes is one teenage kid to take offense at having the score run up on him or the other team's celebration after scoring and decide to get even by 'taking out' someone on the other team (preferably a star). Viola! A bad situation gets even worse.
Whatever happened to "do your best" and "give 100%"? Part of growing up is learning how to deal with failure or loss. If they don't want to be killed on the court, practice harder. The other team certainly is.
Same reason why you don't punch a person while they are down, we have morals. I don't mind winning big, my high school did it all the time, but 135 points is embarrassing the other team on purpose.
So there are two choices: 1) The better team stops "playing" to preserve the feelings of the losers. The losers still realize they suck because they're smart enough to see the other team "stopped" playing the game midway to keep it from looking ugly. The losers fail to get any better since they're aren't really playing in a game and aren't picking up experience. 2) The better team keeps their pace ignoring how the opponent would feel with such a loss. If the losing team is made up of smart kids and/or a good coach, they will use this experience to become better by "practicing" against the better team and learning from them first-hand. They also realize what losing big is like and should create a fire in them to never let it happen again. This is why you let the other team keep pouring it on.
Your #1 is reducing the point to the absurd. The beaten team knows just how badly it was outclassed. Further, there's no 'sparing of feelings' involved. Indeed - to speak to your #2 - being 'patronized' by having the other team 'take it easy' can easily -- and maybe even better -- serve to fuel the fire of wanting to get better. As for the practice thing, that's a false dichotomy. The losing team is playing and therefore practicing. Whether the other team is trying its best or not, the losers here are benefiting from playing together. Coaches will tell you that people/teams benefit most from working with groups that are slightly better -- not vastly superior. I'll add this, too: if the winning coach didn't use the opportunity to develop his 'bench' and give them experience, he's a poor coach.
Slaughtering a team by 135 points is not going to make anyone better in fact I would argue it would make the winning team worse because they expect that to happen every game. I don't mind the score getting run up 60 or 70 points because I agree with your first point that the teams will get better but once you're up by a hundo they could have backed off a little bit. I'm not encouraging the team to give up or miss shots or turn the ball over but just slow it down.
