The Cupertino Courier

Letters & Opinions

Speak Out

Poor sportsmanship
humiliated students

As a parent of a seventh-grade Egan Middle School student, I was extremely displeased and upset with the events surrounding a recent basketball match between Egan and Cupertino Middle School. The match was held at Egan on March 21, between both schools' "C" basketball teams, in which my son played for Egan. In my opinion , the league has improperly monitored the situation on the basketball floor and is contributing to a detrimental decline of my son's and his teammates' feelings of self-worth.

The Egan "C" team is not especially talented in basketball. Many of their games have been decided by fairly large margins. Yet, what I saw on the floor on March 21 was a disgusting display of "piling on points" by the Cupertino team. By the end of the first quarter, Cupertino lead Egan 32-1. By the end of the game, the score was 82-16. I have two points to make about this:

1) Other organized sports operate under "mercy" clauses. In Little League, any run differential above a preset limit after the fifth inning immediately shuts down the game. In Pop Warner football, an excessive point differential initiates some immediate protections to limit losing players from being humiliated, such as the winning team reduced to running plays inside the tackles and not around the ends.

2) When "mercy" clauses are not enforced, then there is the expectation that the coaches perform a self-policing action not to run up scores on their opponents. Some typical methods employed include slowing down the speed of the game, taking out the best players, eliminating full-court presses, etc.

The Cupertino coach took it upon himself to destroy the morale of the Egan students. How? By (1) playing his best players, even in the fourth quarter and (2) keeping the "fast break" effective until the end of the game. After the game, the referees even agreed with me that some top players remained in the game during the fourth quarter. One of their best players continued to show-boat in front of the Egan players, making behind-the-back passes to his teammates and fast break lay-ups.

I discussed these moral violations with the Cupertino coach after the game. He never accepted his responsible role in destroying what was left of any pride in the Egan basketball players. In fact, he preferred to blame the Egan coach for "not stacking his team" with better talent and for accepting continuance of play. Nevertheless, these claims never could possibly excuse the "clinic" that his best players were forcing down the throats of the Egan children.

If it has not been clear what this letter is leading up to, allow me to formalize it in the following way: I am requesting immediate dismissal of the Cupertino "C" basketball coach from his coaching duties. I also request that the league review its self-policing structure that has led to scoring abuses by many of the coaches in the league this season.

Greg Hyver Jr.

Los Altos Hills