Covenant school girls basketball coach Micah Grimes, whose team beat won 100 to 0 in a shut out ball game against a team from Dallas Academy, was fired Sunday for not apologizing for the win:
Grimes, who has been criticized for letting the game get so far out of hand, made it clear in the e-mail Sunday to the newspaper that he does not agree with his school's assessment.
"In response to the statement posted on The Covenant School Web site, I do not agree with the apology or the notion that the Covenant School girls basketball team should feel embarrassed or ashamed," Grimes wrote on www.flightbasketball.com.
"We played the game as it was meant to be played. My values and my beliefs would not allow me to run up the score on any opponent, and it will not allow me to apologize for a wide-margin victory when my girls played with honor and integrity."
Link - via J-Walk Blog
Do you think that they should've invoked the Slaughter Rule? Do you think that Coach Grimes did the right thing by letting the other team lose so badly? Or was it unsportsmanlike conduct?
How in the hell is this a good lesson to teach kids... "its ok darling, if you are a loser and can cut it in the real world, the world will stop so you can catch up.... again".... NO WHERE is this a real life scenario.. no one will stop so you can catch up.. industry and society would still be in the dark ages if the world was run like this
get a grip... the coach was obviously getting better results from his girls than the losing coach.. who I assume still has his job... so kids there-in lies your lesson.. don't succeed or you'll get your arse canned.. suck at your job and get promoted...
the world will be full over politicians and weathermen soon enough!
The two teams are obviously mismatched - which happens regularly during high school sports. There's no excuse to humiliate the other team by running up the score like that.
A life lesson here: it's better to win or lose gracefully than behave like jerks.
The anyone who believes that there "are no winners - only equals" never figured out how to play a game or was too much of a panty-waisted wuss to play in the first place.
The school authorities are a bunch of communistic fools and don't belong in the United States because this country is REPUBLIC, not communistic.
In this day of "everyone gets a gold star for participating" - I am glad to see that some kids learned a little about reality. When everyone wins, no one has the initiative to do better.
And the media is making Dallas Academy sound like it is full of "slow" kids. When in fact it is not.
http://dallas.org/node/605
And invoking the "slaughter rule" is a function of the referees, not the coach. He might suggest it to the refs, but if he calls the game himself he loses, right?
Is something else in play here?
I did read up some more on this interesting news bit. Dallas Academy defines their students as having "learning differences"...an article listed ADD and dyslexia. A pc term for sure that encompasses some learning handicaps but I doubt that would inspire these girls to want to be treated as invalids.
Much respect to the Covenant team for playing like a team who's worked hard at practices and understands the concept of "finish strong".
Much respect to the Dallas team for taking their loss with dignity and understanding that it's merely a game. And many kudos for strengthening the D as the game progressed rather than becoming dejected and defeated. (scored 35 the first quarter and in the fourth, Covenant only managed 12 points).
Much respect to the Covenant coach for taking a previously 2-19 team, understanding how to make his girls the strong team that they are and for sticking to his morals when put under scrutiny.
Shame on the rest of those involved in this sad tale. A game is a game. It's not whether you win or lose... it's how you comport yourself before, during and after the game. By choosing to forfeit now, they are saying that the hardwork put in by both teams is irrelevant and only thing important is to make sure every game here on ends in a tie.
the losing team was from a school for mentally challenged individuals.
in other words, people praising this coach/team for being "competitive" basically are supporting the idea of completely embarassing mentally challenged people.
david: I've volunteered for Special Olympics Basketball tournaments since high school and not once have I seen a player with ADD or dyslexia... I'm not saying those aren't unfortunate problems but your term is a bit too broad. It's like insinuating that pre-olympic athletes were competitively taunting someone with cystic fibrosis; the situtaion is not that extreme. And these Dallas girls weren't embarassed. They took it in stride which is admirable as a team that has loss nearly every game in the past four seasons.
I don't think it was overkill at all. He obviously had the better team, and they won. Not his fault, not his players fault that the other team scored nothing.
It's not HIS job, it's not his teams job to give the other team pity points or an undeserved apology.
I'm sure that would've made the losing team feel SO much better, having to be handed points. Pretty much being told, hey, you SUCK, and we're taking pity on you and letting you score! YAY feel better!.. Pulease.
i don't think he should have been fired
life is rough, ppl need to get used to it. i hate coddling.
The main thing missing is whether the coach was being unsportsmanlike or not. When it was apparent that the game was a mismatch, did the coach change the focus from just winning, to educating his (and perhaps the other team) on tactics, switching roles, letting second / third string in, etc etc., or did he simply run up the score?
Unsportsmanlike conduct can occur when winning or losing; and neither is something you want to see in a coach.
Quite frankly, the terse statements by both coach and school admin say pretty loudly "pre-existing animosity."
I went to a Big 10 school, love to play sports and win, but winning by a margin of more than 50 points is embarrassing. Trouncing an opponent this badly, that never really stood a chance and wasn't talking smack, is also embarrassing. Shooting three pointers and cheering wildly in the 4th quarter with a score like this is pathetic. Pretending that you have Christian and sportsman like values after all is said and done is a lie.
As far as the coach goes, what the hell was he thinking? The coach speaking to the press around the back of the principle while making contradictory statements defiantly got him fired (as it would at most private schools). The coach also needs to place being a role model and a Christan right up there with an effective offense and defense.
At no point do I think the winning team shouldn't have won, but the margin here was just ridiculous. When playing competitive games I always try to start out with my A-game, but if I've already run away with the score I cut back, otherwise I'd just be a sadistic jackass.
I learned. The score was awful, but I learned tricks, positions, their vision of our mistakes. I learned and I had a blast to get blasted : we improved our game after that.
Loosing is part of the game, even if it's 100-0. If you don't want to loose, don't play.
And on a broader view : life is a 100-0 game. Shouldn't we prepare our kids to that?
School isn't all about preparing students for life. If it were, we should allow bullies to roam unchecked through the halls - sorry, kids but that's life, grow some balls. Bring your guns to school, kids; people use them in the real world.
when i played sports at school we got pwned a bunch of times and pwned other teams a bunch of times, its no big deal, it doesnt damage you for life or anything.
they were a better team, they won, thats the end of it.
These are not professional sports teams, or even collegiate sports teams wherein jobs and finances play a role; these are high school teams. There are life lessons beyond crush the weak that could, and should, be imparted.
1) they hit 100 with 4 mins left in game. did the losing team all of the sudden start playing great defense? NO
2) at half time they were up by 59 and still was playing full court press defense
3) getting beat in girls basketball by 100 is not the same as getting beat in football 60-0. it would be the equivalent of getting beat 170-0 in football.
4) he didn't get fired because of the score, he was fired for insubordination
WTF. They need to get their heads out of their asses.
This is nothing to do with PC and everything to do with compassion. You may not apologize when someone doesn't get promoted and you do, but you could console them.
You've confused winning with treating others with dignity. According to your world view, The Germans defeated the Poles, so therefore they had the right to rape and pillage them, right? Of course, the Japs could sack Nanking, for the Chinese were weak willed losers who couldn't keep up. Bury them!
Duke led Maryland by 40 with twelve minutes left Saturday and could have won by 60, but they backed off and won by 41. So is Mike K a pussy by your account?
100-0 was unnecessary and could have been prevented, and it has more to do about a coach and some underlying issues he has about himself.
Was he a good coach or did he stumble upon some talented kids? I'll bet you never hear from this guy again.
I am really not sure how the winning team should have let up. Any alternative would have been MORE humiliating to the losing team in my opinion. Were the supposed to keep passing the ball around and let the other team chase it? Were they supposed to take pity and allow the other team some open shots?
As a former student-athlete, I would be so embarrassed that another team "let" me score.
I thinks this bothers everybody but them. They seem to know they are not very good and would like everybody to shut up now.
Nothing like getting your ass kicked and then have EVERYBODY make a big deal about it.
His job was to coach, and he did his job. The girls were out there to play and they did theirs. As far as the lopsidedness... blame that more on who scheduled the season's competitions at the beginning of the year or who insists on having a severely slanted basketball division or who insists on keeping a Dallas Academy coach with a poor record of coaching. It does no good for Convenant to consistently win with no challenge and Dallas to consistently lose with no incentive to get better.
It's sad that nowadays playing to your potential gets you national scorn and scrutiny. The only thing this experience would teach the girls is that its better to be mediocre.
This shouldn't be up to the coaches. We need to enforce good sportsmanlike conduct by enforcing a point-spread & time rule. The referee should be able to make a judgment call that has to be backed by the opinions of both of the team's coaches.
I think in this situation both teams would've agreed that continuing to play was no longer fun, competitive, or employing good sportmanship.
It was Covenant who wanted the coach to apologize, and it was Covenant that made the judgment call in this case.
Don't say that it's the fault of the kids or coaches at Dallas Academy if it is, in fact, not.
Part of the problem seems to be letting these teams compete against each other. It's like setting up an "B" level team against "AA." You'd -expect- the B team to get slaughtered.
In a game where you clearly outmatch your opponent, even if you feel you must win, it's important to win with grace. I don't get a sense that Covenant didn't win with grace and good sportsmanship, but I didn't see the game. It's really difficult to make that call without actually having been there.
The article also seems to imply that there's no rule for mercy/slaughter in girls basketball. Maybe I read that incorrectly, but based on that assumption, there really wasn't a structure for -providing- a "gentler" (?) out to the losing team.
If I lost a game and the winning side apologized to me I would be ashamed and feel bad for them. Apparently, the Covenant coach did not play his team the way he would have in a tournament. He took advantage of the situation to get court time for second stringers, backed off on defense, and did not engage in anything that could be considered obnoxious while winning.
I'm also sick of the attitude that we ALWAYS need to help those who are less skilled (not less abled) to succeed. It's incredibly annoying at work when I have to continually help the same losers over and over again with the same problem. They've come to expect the help and if I'm busy and can't jump fast enough they whine to my supervisor. Thankfully, my supervisor just listens and it goes no further than her letting me know which whiner was crying again.
If someone shows me how to do something new, I write down the instructions. Then I keep the instructions and refer back to them when I need help. But these losers feel they can't be bothered with that, I should just leap up and help them because, throughout their careers, someone has always helped or been made to help them.
It's called responsibility, people. Take it, own it, show it.
P³
IF I were the school then that would mean I would need to teach him to always do just below his best and to give others a chance. Sorry - that's not right either.
If the game should have been stopped, then perhaps the refs should have done something or talked with both coachs and come to a conclusion. Firing the coach doesn't teach the students in that school anything ... well maybe it teaches them to never try their best at anything.
It is a competetive environment out there in the "real world" - when companies are bidding on a project do you think they get all lovey dovey? NOT!
Mo
Never apologize for being GOOD at something.
This just boils me.