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Mich. girls team wins 115-2, draws ire
By David Eggert, The Associated Press
DETROIT A Michigan high school girls team is seething after it was beaten 115-2, while the winning team claims it tried hard not to run up the score.
Most expected Walkerville High School to beat Hart Lakeshore Public Academy, a school with only 50 students whose team hadn't won a game this season. But the final score from Tuesday night's playoff game incensed Lakeshore academic director Steve Hamilton.
"To me, if you run up the score like that, you have to answer for yourself," he said. "I have my doubts about a school that would go and run up a school by 100 points."
Walkerville contends that it played girls brought up from junior varsity and freshmen teams. The team also says it didn't press on defense, which it normally does, and backed off from going for the state record for points in a game (151).
"What do you tell our girls? Not to play?" Walkerville athletics director Ron Stoneman said. "It had the potential to be really, really bad."
Walkerville coach Steve Kirwin said his school doesn't schedule teams like Lakeshore in the regular season. But during the playoffs, "you play who they tell you to play."
By halftime, Kirwin said, three girls hadn't scored. So he said only they could shoot.
"I'm not going to tell my kids to not continue to play," Kirwin said. "It's not that we wanted to score a ton of points."
Before the season, the Michigan High School Athletic Association did away with a rule designed to keep margins from getting out of hand. Once a team led by 40 or more points in the second half, the clock ran continuously unless the losing team cut the deficit to 30. MHSAA assistant director Nate Hampton said the association had to cut the rule to follow guidelines of the National Federation of State High School Associations.
Hampton said the rule helped to spare teams from embarrassment or humiliation, but he added that "coaching tactics or strategies" can be used instead.
A 115-2 score "is what we've been guarding against the last several years," he said.