170 - 35 (100-12 at half)...Starters start 2nd Half

[CMHCoachNRef]

Originally Posted by bbcoach7

I don't really have a problem with it. If you don't want to take a beat down like that, you have to get better, period. That's how I'd feel if I was the losing coach; we gotta get better. There's not much shame in getting run over by a high powered machine like that. It feels worse to lose a close game.

If you're a zone D team, you play zone D. If you're a M2M team, you play M2M. And if you're a pressing team, then you press! What you never ever do is ask your kids to ease up, or lower your standards for hustle and execution on the defensive side. You can do things on the offensive end- run shot clock down, make 5-6 passes before any shot, play kids out of position, etc. But no coach I ever been around would ask for or tollerate less than best effort on defense.

Regardless of score, the same 5 who started the game always start the 2nd half. Thats standard practice, though certainly not written in stone. Those 5 have earned their starting positions. If they don't start the 2nd half, the effect is that coach is punishing them for being too good. I want to keep my starters motivated, and I reward them for being the best players by starting them. In this Texas example, the starters apparently had to finish the game because the entire benches on both squads were ejected for leaving the bench after a hard foul, 1 minute into the 2nd half.

I haven't heard Lee HS complain in the media about it. Apparently they get it. If you want to be competetive, you have to play well. If you don't play well, you better get better.

I don't care if Lee HS complains about it. I could not disagree with you more. This is a NFHS basketball game. If this team (and coach) are so good, certainly they can come up with a way to play good aggressive man-to-man HALFCOURT defense. Some teams just AREN'T as talented. It has NOTHING to do with working harder, getting better or anything else. We discuss "Sportsmanship" BEFORE every game. If you think 100-12 at half and 170-35 while pressing the entire game meets the definition of "good sportsmanship" expected by the NFHS Rules Committee, I think you are sadly mistaken.

Starting the second half with your STARTERS with a 100-12 halftime lead -- NICE TOUCH!!! "Standard Practice" -- BULL!!! "Standard Practice" does NOT involve an 88 point half time lead. Classless, you can't convince me otherwise, you can't make excuses otherwise. This coach is nothing but BUSH LEAGUE PERIOD.

Generally, coaches have some level of intelligence. They have the ability to evaluate a situation and take good logical steps to gain the most out of a situation. This coach's actions make it appear as though coaches have NO ABILITY to adjust to situations that occur in a game. We ALWAYS start our best players. We ALWAYS press. We ALWAYS FAST BREAK. We ALWAYS start our starters to start the second half.

I am embarassed to be associated with the coaching profession. This was a disgrace.

I will say, I will be rooting for lots of other teams from the Lone Star State come tournament time.

Just my own personal opinion.

[bbcoach7]

I've had to deal with this kind of situation 3 out of my last 4 games; however no where near the degree of this Texas example. I'm somewhat embarased and feel badly for my opponent when we win by a big margin. I can't imagine how I'd feel if we beat a team by such a huge margin. In these games, we were up 30+ points in the 1st half in each one. We press, but stop when we get a 20 point lead. If the opponent gets it under 20, we press again. I do what I can to not run it up; play subs most of the minutes, play kids out of position, etc.

What we never do is compromize our standards. We are never going to pull back and just let a team easily catch and shoot, no mater the score. That's how bad habits develop. My last player off the bench better be fronting the post, denying the wing, pressuring the ball, challenging all shots, and playing just as hard as my 1-5 players for the entire game no matter what the score is. Last Friday we were up by 29 with several minutes left. It was all subs in the game and they started playing slow, not flying around like I demand. I called a time out to remind them that their playing time is directly effected by their hustle on the defensive end. I also didn't allow my team to shoot the ball in our last 2 possessions.

Who we are and what we do is independent of the score, or said another way, the score is irrelevant to our standards. My IRL job before I retired was a forestry firefighter. I retired as a captain; so I know a thing or two about never compromizing your standards, it's ingrained in me. While I've never been anywhere near the situation of this Texas team, I'd like to believe that my standards for my team would be the same even with a 100+ point lead. "This is who we are, and this is what we do." The score board is irrelevant.

I know you don't agree, and that's fine. You are good at what you do, and I'm good at what I do. Some of you have coaching experience, but I suspect if you were very good at it, or enjoyed coaching, you wouldn't be posting here as an official. It's not for everyone. I'm good at what I do and not by the standard of winning, but by the standard of kids have fun and they learn about more than just how to make a lay up or defend the pick & roll. They learn life skills, like my coaches taught me. The question begs to be asked, what do kids learn from me by this "standard." They learn to always give their best effort. They learn to never compromize their personal, or an organizations (team) standards. They learn the reward of hard work. When we are up like that (score board) I'm reminding my kids at every time out to help them up if you knock them down, be humble, don't trash talk, etc. But always, always, keep playing hard. We want our opponents to know we are going to play them hard, and they are in for a battle, even when we are not good. We want that to be our "corner stone." We win not because it's the goal, but because we have high standards and we don't compromize them. Winning is the result of doing things right. Having high standards and not compromizing is part of doing things right. Worked for me IRL in the fire aservice, and works coaching too.

I'm in the NW corner of CA. A geographical area notorious for being socially liberal and soft. If I was a bully, or a run-it-up type coach, I wouldn't last.

[CMHCoachNRef]

Originally Posted by bbcoach7

I've had to deal with this kind of situation 3 out of my last 4 games; however no where near the degree of this Texas example. I'm somewhat embarased and feel badly for my opponent when we win by a big margin. I can't imagine how I'd feel if we beat a team by such a huge margin. In these games, we were up 30+ points in the 1st half in each one. We press, but stop when we get a 20 point lead. If the opponent gets it under 20, we press again. I do what I can to not run it up; play subs most of the minutes, play kids out of position, etc.

What we never do is compromize our standards. We are never going to pull back and just let a team easily catch and shoot, no mater the score. That's how bad habits develop. My last player off the bench better be fronting the post, denying the wing, pressuring the ball, challenging all shots, and playing just as hard as my 1-5 players for the entire game no matter what the score is. Last Friday we were up by 29 with several minutes left. It was all subs in the game and they started playing slow, not flying around like I demand. I called a time out to remind them that their playing time is directly effected by their hustle on the defensive end. I also didn't allow my team to shoot the ball in our last 2 possessions.

Who we are and what we do is independent of the score, or said another way, the score is irrelevant to our standards. My IRL job before I retired was a forestry firefighter. I retired as a captain; so I know a thing or two about never compromizing your standards, it's ingrained in me. While I've never been anywhere near the situation of this Texas team, I'd like to believe that my standards for my team would be the same even with a 100+ point lead. "This is who we are, and this is what we do." The score board is irrelevant.

I know you don't agree, and that's fine. You are good at what you do, and I'm good at what I do. Some of you have coaching experience, but I suspect if you were very good at it, or enjoyed coaching, you wouldn't be posting here as an official. It's not for everyone. I'm good at what I do and not by the standard of winning, but by the standard of kids have fun and they learn about more than just how to make a lay up or defend the pick & roll. They learn life skills, like my coaches taught me. The question begs to be asked, what do kids learn from me by this "standard." They learn to always give their best effort. They learn to never compromize their personal, or an organizations (team) standards. They learn the reward of hard work. When we are up like that (score board) I'm reminding my kids at every time out to help them up if you knock them down, be humble, don't trash talk, etc. But always, always, keep playing hard. We want our opponents to know we are going to play them hard, and they are in for a battle, even when we are not good. We want that to be our "corner stone." We win not because it's the goal, but because we have high standards and we don't compromize them. Worked for me IRL in the fire aservice, and works coaching too.

I'm in the NW corner of CA. A geographical area notorious for being socially liberal and soft. If I was a bully, or a run-it-up type coach, I wouldn't last.

BBCoach,
Actually, I love to coach and I love to officiate. BOTH jobs are very challenging and very rewarding. Not many folks have a passion for both. I do -- in both soccer and basketball.

I have no problem whatsoever with playing aggressively throughout the game. A team can play an aggresssive non-trapping man-to-man defense all game long. If a team cannot effectively run a halfcourt offense, I don't care how well they run on the break, I can beat them. I can drop four players back on a shot, if need be. The point is, I can pretty much force you to beat me in the half court (obviously, if I don't have any "horses", this may not apply, but someone will have the ability to force this coach's team to run a half court offense).

Therefore, once a team is up 100 - 12 at halftime, this would present an excellent opportunity to work on a half court offense. Work on holding the ball for the final shot at the end of a quarter by running 15 - 30 seconds off the clock three or four possessions in a row. Teams must still remain very focused in order to protect the ball and get a high percentage shot at a particular time interval.

You indicated that your team manages to keep up its intensity while not full court pressing. My team can do the same. Why could this coach not figure out the same thing? Winning by 135 points in a NFHS game just fails the logic test, in my opinion.

By the way, good discussion on this topic.

[bbcoach7]

Originally Posted by Camron Rust

I disagree. There are a lot of things you can do.

Or maybe I wasn't clear. Yes, I agree there are a lot of things you can do.

If you're a M2M team, you change to zone, so they can learn a new part of the game...and vice versa. If you're a pressing team, you fall back and play half court.

I essentially agree with you. I'm a defensive minded coach, and any coach who presses a lot is too. So I have multiple defenses. If I'm way up on the board, then I will work on my weakest defense by playing it a lot. But it isn't going to make a lot of difference because as any coach will tell you, you can run anything -offense and defense- against an over matched team and it will be effective. I agree about not pressing. There's no such thing as a pressing team that doesn't have a half court defense. You have to. Even this TX team will eventually meet a team in the playoffs that can beat its press.

It does you no good to tune your press on a team that can't challenge it. You put your team into a situation that will challenge them...at least more than doing what they're best at.

I essentially agree with you. Except that in this particular TX situation, and in that particular game, there's no such thing. When one team is that much better, you can't even the playing field; and if you really try, the humiliation is even greater. Best thing is to just get it over with.

You match your guards up on their post players, you match your post players up on their guards. Make your guards learn to play against bigger opponents and make your post players learn how to defend on the perimeter. That will do them a lot more good for their personal skill development than letting them dominate a weaker opponent in their strongest positions.

I've done exactly that, and against an overmatched opponent, it made little difference in the dominance. It's just embarassing to them. I know, I've been on the recieving end of such attempts at charity. This did work to keep the score down at Jr High level. But my posts in HS can put the ball on the floor and shoot from outside much better than when they were in Jr High. And my smalls work on post moves and post defense 2-3 times a week.

But, I agree with your premise.... there's always something a coach can do to make it more fair. For me the goal is to balance that with not appearing to be giving "charity." That's worse.

[Camron Rust]

Originally Posted by bbcoach7

Or maybe I wasn't clear. Yes, I agree there are a lot of things you can do.
...

But, I agree with your premise.... there's always something a coach can do to make it more fair. For me the goal is to balance that with not appearing to be giving "charity." That's worse.

Sounds like we're on the same page then.

[bbcoach7]

(since you're a coach too) as an example of you can run anything and it will work against an inferior opponent, the 1st two possessions last Friday night my team ran "Swing" (our M2M O) against a 2-3 zone. We got the lay up on the flex cut both times. I was hollering "13" (zone O for two guard front) and they couldn't hear me. So the PG just called out "Swing." Probably should have let them keep running it

[Jurassic Referee]

It is kind of interesting to get the viewpoint of these outa-sight games from a coach's standpoint. But what we have to remember as officials is that that none of it is really that relevant to what we are supposed to do.

We're supposed to call the game evenly and equitably with no bias shown at either end, no matter what we might personally think about a team running up the score. Yes, we might make a few "adjustments" to try and get the game over quicker, but these adjustments shouldn't be made to the detriment of either team. One of the adjustments is to make damn sure that the players on the winning team show absolutely NO signs of any unsporting behavior that might set off the losing team. No trash-talking, posing, pointing, exuberant displays, etc, should be allowed. Nip 'em, nip 'em in the bud!! Imo our main job in one of these games is just to ensure that the game is kept under control until we can get t'hell outa there. We surashell don't want any incidents to occur from retaliation to the score being run up. And during the game, do not make any comments to anybody about the score being run up. The comment might be directed to your partner only, but you may be overheard...and quoted.

And post-game, also keep your comments strictly between you and your officiating buds. Do NOT make any comments to anyone else about the score being run up or the lack of sportsmanship shown. It's is up to that league's governing body to take any further action if they deem it warranted; it is no longer our bidness. If you are asked for a report, stick strictly to the facts. Keep your personal opinion out of it.

JMHKGP.

[26 Year Gap]

One thing I like about FL is that in the 2nd half, there is a running clock if a team leads by 35 or more points. That would get those kinds of games over more quickly and coaches would know that players who normally do not get as many minutes will need to be in there early to get much playing time.