This past week I caught wind of a particularly sad and shameful story that came out of Texas. Two weeks ago in a high school girls basketball game between Covenant School and Dallas Academy, Covenant School won by a margin of 100-0. Yup, 100-0.
Apparently spectators and an assistant coach on the Covenant bench were cheering and encouraging the girls to reach the century mark. They beat up on a team of eight girls from a school that only has 20 girls altogether and has not won a single game in the past four years. And, by the way, the score of the game at halftime was 59-0.
A week later, the headmaster and board chair of Covenant issued a statement on the private Christian school's website that stated, It is shameful and an embarrassment that this happened. This clearly does not reflect a Christlike and honorable approach to competition.""
The head coach responded in an e-mail to a local newspaper that he would not apologize ""for a wide-margin victory when my girls played with honor and integrity."" That coach was fired Sunday.
Good riddance, I say. There is such a thing as making a statement, and then there is being malicious. It was a girls high school basketball game. Many times, the combined scores of each team does not even add up to 100 at the high school level. Mathematically, 100 points in a 32 minute game equates to more than three points every minute. To compare, an NBA team would have to score at least 150 points in regulation to match that rate of points per minute in a game - that rarely ever happens. For a coach to allow his players to slaughter an opponent that has not scored even a single point into unimaginable oblivion is disgraceful, no matter what the game or level of play.
Furthermore, what kind of example is that coach setting for his players? As a student teacher and fledgling high school girls basketball coach myself, I know that I have to convey the same standards and discipline to my players that I want them to demonstrate on the court. If Covenant's former coach conveyed to his players that it is OK to beat the lights out of their opponent with no restraint and no mercy, even though the game was over before halftime, then can he really claim that his girls played with honor and integrity? They were executing orders - his orders - and there was no honor or integrity in what went down in that gym two weeks ago.
You never hear of professional teams or even collegiate teams intentionally piling up the points when the game is all but over. Sure, teams have blowout wins here and there. The Pittsburgh Steelers lit up the Cleveland Browns 31-0 a month ago. Tennessee destroyed Chattanooga 114-75 on the hardwood in their season opener this year. The Yankees crushed the Kansas City Royals 15-6 back in August. But none of those instances were egregious attempts to maul, embarrass and humiliate the lesser team. In fact, I would bet that Pittsburgh and Tennessee each had second or third stringers in the game towards the end and did their best to kill the clock.
Besides, none of those instances even come close to rivaling the scale of imbalance between Covenant School and Dallas Academy. Academy did not score any points during the contest, and they have not won a game in the past three years. There was no reason for vengeance, no past score to settle. They did it because they could, under the direction of an unsportsmanlike coach and the encouragement of some raunchy, greedy fans.
When a game ceases to be a contest and becomes a one-sided exhibition, teams should change their play accordingly. After all, it is no longer a contest at 59-0 in high school. Not to say they should give up, throw in the towel and let the other team have a chance, but they should ease up and be a good sport. Players, coaches and fans alike know that the game is over when you put the last five girls on the bench out to chew up the clock after half time. There is no excuse for shooting threes in the second half. That's just downright pathetic.
Do you think Covenant School displayed poor sportsmanship? E-mail Andy at avansistine@wisc.edu.
