Sacred Heart Coach Suspended for Running up Score (merged)

[LwrcasefaN]

At what point are you humiliating a team versus you're playing a team that's just REALLY bad? I wasn't at this game, but 92-4 sounds as if not a lot of was done by the Sacred Heart Coach. Maybe the league should have a mercy rule. Now...I believe that sometimes you just need to take your whoopiing, but this even by my standards seems excessive. What do you think?

Sacred Heart Academy apologizes, suspends coach after 92-4 girls basketball score against Lyman Hall

 

[nwhoopfan]

Scoring 92 isn't exactly excessive. It's not like they scored 120 or 130 or something. If the opponent was only able to score 4 points...I don't even have words for that. Maybe they just shouldn't even bother trying to have a basketball program.

 

[JellyBean]

That is pretty excessive. Just reading the article. I mean....29-0, 56-0, and 80-0...SMH. Not cool. Poor sportsmanship on display.

 

[Vowelguy]

29-0
27-0
24-0
12-4

According to the opposing coach, SHA pressed the 1st half, played aggressive man 2nd half, and was shooting 3s all game.

It would seem it should've been pretty easy to go zone, say No 3s, and walk the ball up.

I also wonder if Sheehan has had any CV issues that has left them even more depleted.

 

[LwrcasefaN]

29-0
27-0
24-0
12-4

According to the opposing coach, SHA pressed the 1st half, played aggressive man 2nd half, and was shooting 3s all game.

It would seem it should've been pretty easy to go zone, say No 3s, and walk the ball up.

I also wonder if Sheehan has had any CV issues that has left them even more depleted.

Yep...and they did this with the clock running! They could have just taken half court shots and won!

 

[CL82]

Did he pull his starters?

 

[sun]

I wonder how many of his bench players were allowed to play?

Sacred Heart Academy apologizes, suspends coach after 92-4 girls basketball score against Lyman Hall

Sacred Heart Academy issued an apology Tuesday after the varsity basketball team defeated...

www.ctinsider.com

 

[Stymie]

Inexcusable.
Sorry.

 

[Jmsdawg]

My take: They suspended the wrong coach. The losing team was obviously overmatched . Asking the players to have mercy on an opponent should not require a player to not play the game as best they can. Once the losing coach realized his team was not competitive he should slow the game down and if that does not work forfeit.

 

[Geew1992]

So the coach is supposed to tell his players to stop playing?? This is ridiculous.

 

[sun]

So the coach is supposed to tell his players to stop playing?? This is ridiculous.

The CT coach should have pulled out all of his starters and put in subs to show that he tried to keep the score down.
If he did that then he may be able to appeal the suspension.
But if he didn't then it shows that he's a bad coach by running up the score.
They're suppose to be teaching kids about sportsmanship and how to be "good sports" by knowing when there's enough effort expended to easily win.

In Montana, they've employed a running clock rule in the 2nd half once a team takes a 40 point lead.

https://cdn2.sportngin.com/attachments/document/0085/2026/MHSA_Basketball_Mercy_Rule.pdf

 

[CL82]

The CT coach is suppose to pull out all of his starters and put in subs

Do we know that he didn’t do that?

 

[sun]

Do we know that he didn’t do that?

No, that's why I asked in the opening post.
The fact that he's been suspended would seem to indicate that the coach wasn't cooperative.
But we don't know for sure from the article.

 

[pk1234]

Should have taken the press off after the 1Q (he pressed whole 1st Half) and should have gone into either a zone or token man-to-man in the second half, and not "fast-breaked". Learning lesson for the SHA coach who apparently has a really, really good team and may find themselves in a similar situation again.

 

[Stymie]

56-0 at the half?
80-0 after 3 quarters?
4th quarter scoring was 12-4.
He knew what to do.
He just chose not to do it.

 

[Blakeon18]

Phil Mushnick of the NY Post regularly complains about coaches in college running up the score...one factor he constantly mentions is not playing the bench to his liking. And...yes...Geno is oft mentioned in his columns...as is Kim Mulkey....he clearly looks for wide/wide margins in games and then uses them as examples.

He has offered this 'solution' more than once.
He thinks the losing coach...when he/she is sufficiently upset about what is happening...should instruct her team to intentionally score baskets FOR the other team....i.e. keep making lay-ups when you get the ball...in your own basket.
That solution according to Mushnick would so embarrass the coach of the other team they would stop whatever they are doing...pressing/pushing the ball/shooting threes etc.

 

[Hey Adrien!]

A few years ago, our girls' 5th/6th grade coach was out sick and I had to step in to coach his away game.

We got dominated. They had an athletic 5'10 player who would lead a half court trap (no press allowed until last minute of game) and then drive for a layup. My team was mostly new players and it was early in the season, so they had trouble adjusting to my strategy to break the half-court trap.

By the middle of the 2nd quarter, the other team barely used their seven bench players and we were down something like 22-0. I asked the other coach what is #33 doing still in the game? and his response was she's a sixth grader, we get that asked a lot or some idiotic response like that.

He didn't sit the girl or adjust their half-court trap strategy til midway through the 3rd quarter. I think we ended up losing the game 40-6.

By the end of the game, the ref was a classy guy and commiserated with me how I tried to handle the game, but I was fuming. After texting my AD, I got an apology email from the school's AD the following day. Next time I visited the school, the AD met with me in person to tell me that coach no longer works for the school...

In summary, I agree with this suspension .

 

[eyeroll]

Do folks even read the articles? It literally says in there, from the opposing coach, that they pressed all of the first half and then went into a m2m in the second half - no zone. He also said they never stopped fast breaking the entire game. I love that the school suspended him. They are clearly a talented team (at least relative to their competition) and they sent the message to those young women that there is a right way where everyone can feel better. I can't help but think that some of the girls on that winning team also probably felt bad, but did what their coach wanted to.

 

[CL82]

No, that's why I asked in the opening post.
The fact that he's been suspended would seem to indicate that the coach wasn't cooperative.
But we don't know for sure from the article.

It’s hard to tell how much of that is reaction to the score, and how much of that was his specific actions.

Keeping the press on, fast breaking and refusing to go zone makes his decision making seem suspect though.

 

[JustbrewitMan]

Did he pull his starters?

It seems that way. Here's the boxscore. Total of 12 players listed are from SH, each scored at least 2 pts.

Scoreboard

www.ctinsider.com

 

[CL82]

29-0
27-0
24-0
12-4

According to the opposing coach, SHA pressed the 1st half, played aggressive man 2nd half, and was shooting 3s all game.

It would seem it should've been pretty easy to go zone, say No 3s, and walk the ball up.

I also wonder if Sheehan has had any CV issues that has left them even more depleted.

Of course, another way to express that is that he called off the press after the first half. Looking at the foul disparity it seems like they could get to the rim at will. Was taking lower percentage threes away to keep the other team from fouling out? It does appear that he played everyone on his roster a decent amount of time, so he probably didn’t keep his starters in. Of course there’s no justification for not walking the ball up, unless the bench did what it was taught to do. Sometimes kids get excited to play and show what they can do against an actual opponent.

Look, I’m not defending the guy. He probably was an ass hat, but sometimes people are like oh look at the score he must’ve done something wrong. At the high school level, there can be huge disparities between the top teams and the bottom teams.

 

[JustbrewitMan]

Of course, another way to express that is that he called off the press after the first half. Looking at the foul disparity it seems like they could get to the rim at will. Was taking lower percentage threes away to keep the other team from fouling out? It does appear that he played everyone on his roster a decent amount of time, so he probably didn’t keep his starters in. Of course there’s no justification for not walking the ball up, unless the bench did what it was taught to do. Sometimes kids get excited to play and show what they can do against an actual opponent.

Look, I’m not defending the guy. He probably was an ass hat, but sometimes people are like oh look at the score he must’ve done something wrong. At the high school level, there can be huge disparities between the top teams and the bottom teams.

Agree 100% with your last sentence. Daughter played HS softball. Even the difference between a middle-tier and bottom-tier team can be striking. If not for the Mercy Rule in softball, there would be some games where the score of a 7-inning game could easily be 50-0 or more.

 

[JellyBean]

56-0 at the half?
80-0 after 3 quarters?
4th quarter scoring was 12-4.
He knew what to do.
He just chose not to do it.

Yup. He knew, probably during warmups most definitely by tip-off, that he had the superior team. I wonder if there was a shot clock for this league. That is another topic for another day.

 

[Geew1992]

Yup. He knew, probably during warmups most definitely by tip-off, that he had the superior team. I wonder if there was a shot clock for this league. That is another topic for another day.

No shot clock in CT high school.

 

[Horatio]

I watched the game. I’m a 1000% CT girls basketball dad, instructor, coach and donor that has three daughters (ages 8-15) that play basketball in New Haven county. It’s been my life for almost a decade. My kids have been opponents of that Sacred Heart coach , year round ( AAU, Travel, and now High School) for a decade. He’s a good guy and champion of the sport.

From my observation, the focus should be on why is Lyman Hall, a private school, fielding a team that is that weak. The coach of Lyman Hall has been their 19 YEARS!!!! Lyman Hall is in a situation in which they can recruit girls. No excuse.

Overall, Connecticut is the size of a broom closet but these towns feel that they can have 3-5 high schools that have competitive basketball. Impossible. You can’t have the same amount of high school and AAU teams as larger states and expect to be competitive.
It’s a major issue. There’s just not enough girls for every team. Lyman Hall, and others, should consider canceling their program or merge with another weak program.