I am a competitive person. No matter what it is, I play to win. As I have gotten older, I have adjusted my philosophy a little, though. I have matured enough to realize that I am not going to win every time.
If I don”t win, though, I want to at least be in the game. I feel much better about losing if I lose by a little than I do when I lose by a bunch.
The coach of a Texas girls” high school basketball team was recently fired because he allowed his team to defeat a rival team by the score of 100-0. A parent who witnessed the game said an assistant coach for Covenant, a private Christian school, “cheered wildly as the team hit three-pointers in the fourth quarter to edge closer to 100 points.”
The Covenant girls were playing against Dallas Academy, a school that primarily teaches youngsters with attention span problems and dyslexia.
I have always taken pride in being a compassionate winner. I have never had a need or desire to annihilate opponents. I have certainly met people who do. It seems apparent that the basketball coach at Covenant is one.
That coach, Micah Grimes, refused to apologize for squashing the Dallas Academy girls” team. He said he had no regrets ” for a wide-margin victory when my girls played with honor and integrity.” I see no honor or integrity in the act of utterly humiliating another team, especially a team of players who already deal with issues that impact self-esteem.
All of the blame should not be heaped on the terminated coach, though. Because competitive levels vary widely, many school athletic conferences, especially for high school level and below, have implemented safeguards to help keep an overmatched team from suffering horrendous humiliation.
Some of the methods include forcing the leading team to pull their starters and input second and third string players when an agreed upon lead is reached. Continuously running the clock until the end of the game, once a team builds a large lead, is another way to control the final score.
In one school district, winning by more than 50 points is classified as “unsportsmanlike”. If it happens, the winning coach is suspended for the team”s next game.
Even in college and the professional leagues, no one likes to have another team run up the score. Yet, it still happens. It has been the cause of numerous brawls, especially in football and basketball. In the Denver Nuggets-New York Knicks melee of 2006, the Knicks claimed the Nuggets were running up the score.
Former Oklahoma University basketball coach, Billy Tubbs, was famous for trouncing opponents whenever possible. He once quipped, “If they don”t like it, they should get better.”
It”s easier to get better in college and the pros, where coaches recruit the best or pay them millions of dollars. Up to the high school level, coaches have to play the youngsters who go out for the team. The player pool in small schools, like Dallas Academy, is limited. There are just 20 girls at Dallas Academy. Eight of them are on the basketball team.
I am not convinced that the Covenant coach should have lost his job. Perhaps a written reprimand and a one-game suspension would have been enough punishment. But, the fact that Covenant is a Christian school and the coach was unwilling to apologize probably sealed his fate.
The school placed this announcement on its website, “It is shameful and an embarrassment that this happened. This clearly does not reflect a Christ-like and honorable approach to competition.”
I loved the determination of the late Vince Lombardi. Superbowl teams compete for the Vince Lombardi Trophy. Lombardi once said, “Winning isn”t everything; it”s the only thing.”
It”s a good philosophy for professional sports, but, through high school, I think teaching good sportsmanship should be on equal footing with the challenge for coaches to win games.
Gary Dickson is the publisher of the Record-Bee. He can be reached at gdickson@record-bee.com or called direct at 263-5636 ext. 24.
