What Can You Say?

It was a fairly interesting day today.

This morning, we had our 8th grade football practice for 2 hours. After we finished and kicked back in the coaches room, we got a phone call from the athletic director at our school. He told us to tell the head varsity coach to call him right away as soon as the varsity was done with practice.

Let me build you up a little bit to know where this story is going. Some of you may already know what has happened, since it's already starting to appear on regional and state news web sites.

Anyway, the varsity has been going all out this week, watching tapes, lifting those extra weights -- so on and so forth -- for their first game of the season on Friday night. The kids were so pumped up for their first game of the season, but all of a sudden it all came crashing back down to earth.

The head varsity coach, once he got in, called the athletic director. As it turns out, the opposing team suspended roughly 17 of their players due to the fact that they got caught partying. I'm sure they were against team rules, like staying out past a curfew, but from what I've heard, there was alcohol involved. In high school sports, plus the fact that it is against the law, is a huge no-no.

The opposing team were forced to forfeit the game. Sure, us coaches had a hearty laugh about it, but it was kind of a downer to realize that we were not going to have a football game on Friday night.

I have to commend the opposing team for doing this and this is the reason: there are so many other schools that when they are stuck in a similar situation, they try all means by covering it up. It's probably happened at almost every school district in the area -- and I know for a fact that it's happened back in South Dakota. Administrators, staff, teachers, and coaches -- just for a slight second -- think that once athletics prove to be more important than academics and the safety of the students, thus the cover-up. I'm sure that there are things on the line, like post-secondary scholarship opportunities, booster clubs, fund raising, saving face in the community, etc., are possibly other reasons why school districts play it down in case if their students get in trouble (this is just an opinion -- I'm not an expert on this subject).

Think of it at another angle, taking in perspective of the above things listed. What if this would have happened towards the end of the season? What if this team had probably a legitimate shot of making the state tournament? What if there were a few stand-out players that could possibly play D-I or D-II ball in college? It seems a lot easier to deal with the problem now, especially when the team hasn't even played yet, compared to a game later on in the regular season.

But either way, the opposing team did the right thing. The administration stepped up and are taking the embarrassment that these players have brought upon the school, like they should. They are serving a suspension -- and who knows if it'll last another week.

As an educator, I'm starting to realize the importance of the profession -- whether it's having morals, professional ethics, your personal philosophy, whatever -- things or situations should be done the right way in which it benefits the community (or the school district), not just have a small group of people be the voice of a larger group of people.