Bobby is currently the General Manager and Assistant Publisher at the Daily Statesman after serving his term as Managing Editor. He wears many hats in the office, including coordinator of all things online, but his real passion is sports.

When is enough enough?

Posted Tuesday, January 19, 2010, at 9:40 PM

The Lady Bearcats opened play in the new Bearcat Event Center Thursday evening by walloping an overmatched Caruthersville team 101-11.

Why?

What did embarassing another team by 90 points accomplish?

Honestly?

Before I go any further I do want to say that this team is packed with some amazing young ladies that have been taught the fundamentals and sportsmanship over the years. Players must execute what the coaching staff throws their way. I have no beef with these ladies and would encourage everyone to support them.

In today's world when we hear more and more great stories about sportsmanship and 'doing the right thing,' like the girl hitting a homerun and being carried around the bases by the opponent, the special needs kid dressing, playing and scoring, the unselfish football player taking a knee on the one yard line, etc.

Running a delay game and not taking a shot for three quarters would be a nice showing of sportsmanship in this case albeit boring for the fans. Can't use the fans as an excuse though. Good coaching staffs COACH like their is no one in the gymnasium other than the players. Playing three quarters of 'no shot' ball would have been a perfect opportunity to work on some serious passing drills.

Dexter, being the largest town in Stoddard County, has garnered quite a reputation over the past few years. Not always a good reputation either. While the smaller school districts struggle to compete financially, scholastically, and in athletics, the envy, jealousy, or whatever it is continues to grow negatively towards Dexter. Pounding an overmatched ladies basketball team by 90 points is not helping the cause!

You don't 'accidently' outscore your opponent by 90 points and I hope I NEVER see another game like this.

Was there a personal vendetta against someone from Caruthersville involved in this game? Does the coaching staff get some sort of 'high' from these antics? Was this payback? When is enough enough?

Comments

View 13 comments

Note: The nature of the Internet makes it impractical for our staff to review every comment. Please note that those who post comments on dexterstatesman.com may do so using a screen name, which may or may not reflect a website user's actual name. Readers should be careful not to assign comments to real people who may have names similar to screen names. Refrain from obscenity in your comments, and to keep discussions civil, don't say anything in a way your grandmother would be ashamed to read.

No one wonders why Dexter is despised by neighboring towns, what classless coaches we have always had in many cases. SHAMEFUL, not the girls fault.

-- Posted by changedname on Fri, Jan 15, 2010, at 5:58 PM
Coach Hale always ran up the scores. Left the starters in the game.

-- Posted by changedname on Fri, Jan 15, 2010, at 7:30 PM
Best I remember Coach Hall never did that.

-- Posted by changedname on Fri, Jan 15, 2010, at 7:47 PM
Gentlemen, I know and understand what all of you are saying. There have been times in the past that the score has been run up by teams from Dexter. No question. With that said, let me tell you that I know Coach Allen personally and the person that I know is an honorable and decent man.

I believe that there were a number of factors for the lopsided score. The biggest factor of all is that the team they played was absolutely horrible. I mean no disrespect to them but that is a fact. Coach Allen made an attempt to drop them from the schedule after last years game but C'ville wanted to play them this year regardless. Dexter will play Farmington next year as opposed to C'ville.

Every player on the roster saw ample amounts of playing time. What do you do? Do you tell them not to play defense? Look at the box score. C'ville had one player that could put the ball in the basket. When on offense, do you tell them not to shot the ball if they are open? I suppose you can work on your 4 corners offense just for practice but what good does that do you when you when the kids on the other team are ready to get on the bus? Also, do you think that the parents of the kid that doesn't get a whole lot of playing time wants to see their kid practice on their passing?

Please don't get me wrong. I'm not the type of person that takes joy in seeing teams get the crap beat out of them. I can't stand it when people run up the score just because they can. But I know Coach Allen and I don't find him to be a bully in the least.

-- Posted by robbincrosby on Sat, Jan 16, 2010, at 9:13 PM
Bobby I agree with you that we shouldn't blame the girls for this kind of win, but it ends there. Yes we should blame the coaches, but not Dexter's we should blame Caruthersville's.

You can't be serious about running a delay game for 3 quarters. How embarssing would that have been to C'ville? Really how much work would the girls get from some "passing drills" against this team? What would have happened was Dexter would have held the ball for 24 minutes and we all would have went home. How is that helping anybody?

As you said "good coaching staffs coach like there's no one in the gymnasium". Maybe you should have directed this to Caruthersville than Dexter. Why? I'll tell you,

1. There was only one timeout called, and that was with 1:22 left in the 4th quarter. In an "accidently" beating of 90 points I think a "good coaching staff" would have called more.

2. Between games the coach came back to the bench with a soda and popcorn! Maybe we should have ran a movie for him on the big screen.

3. After a made basket, they passed the ball in only to pass it back to the inbounder while she was still out of bounds. This fundemental should be learned in 3rd grade Physial Education class, this type of mistake should never happen on the High School level.

4. After a Caruthersville player came out of the game, she was sitting on the bench talking on her cell phone, and the coaches did nothing about it.

All I'm trying to say is that all the blame for this is not Dexter's nor Coach Allens fault. Some of the blame has to be placed on Caruthersville. Maybe in this "politically correct world" we should not keep score, when team A scores then they should let team B score a goal. Then everybody would go home happy.

-- Posted by dexter_dad on Sun, Jan 17, 2010, at 9:40 AM
I think, in this case, it is not Coach Allen's fault. But I do believe he is catching a lot of grief because of all the instances in the past of Dexter coaches running up scores, against MUCH SMALLER TEAMS, just for the sake of it. I witnessed, upon moving to Missouri sometime ago, basketball games (girls, boys, jv, varsity,etc.) where Dexter teams were up by 20-30 points and coaches had their teams pressing in the 4th quarter. I have seen Dexter teams keep Varsity players in games long after the game was decided...and in a conference where they are so much LARGER than the teams they play. I think the multitude of instances where this happened leads many people to always have a negative opinion of the school district, its administration, and its coaches in instances like this one....even when UNDESERVED (as in this case). If the game was played, in the PAST, with more class and respect for the opponent...then Coach Allen might be given the benefit of the doubt here (as he deserves). High school sports is supposed to be a learning experience for the students, just remember this.

In this case....it sounds, looks like it was as much the fault of the visiting team as anyone, and Coach Allen and the Dexter girls may have just been a victim of circumstance.

-- Posted by hssportsfan on Sun, Jan 17, 2010, at 1:34 PM
Coconut, I agree 100%, this should never happen but has been the normal at Dexter the past few years. It's ugly.

-- Posted by changedname on Sun, Jan 17, 2010, at 5:46 PM
The Dexter team should be using game time to prepare for a run for a state championship. Getting caught up in how many points they win by right now is foolish. Call it classless if you like, but I wouldn't waist a second not getting ready for that. It's unfortunate that C'ville sucks, but to sympathize about the margin of victory is dumb.

Coco - be sure to check out my other post on the other article about this. You heard.

-- Posted by layne staley on Sun, Jan 17, 2010, at 8:39 PM
Coco and changed. It's obvious that whatever defense I and other posters have for Coach Allen are not going to sway your opinion. That's fine. However, I would venture to say that neither of you have stepped foot in a gym to watch a girls basketball game since high school, if then. The quality of play is leaps and bounds above what is was like 10-20 years ago. If you think the scoring differential is bad now, just wait until this group of middle school girls get to high school. These girls (if they stay together and keep their heads on straight) are the real deal. They have dominated every team they have played and have a great mix of height and agility and have several that can score. Plus, above all, they are hard workers. When they join up with these freshman and sophomore girls that are getting quality playing time on the varsity, watch out. When you mix that with a team with the work ethic of say, a Caruthersvile, it could get ugly, often.

-- Posted by robbincrosby on Sun, Jan 17, 2010, at 9:27 PM
I say kick 'em when they are down! Beating Cape Central 8th Grade 72-2, shooting a last second 3 at the buzzer to win 100 to 20something, 101-11!!!!! Any of you making excuses for this crap have not asked a quality coach their opinion on this topic. And great to know more of the same is coming soon. As if these are the first teams capable of running up a score. "Goooooot iiiiit"!!!!!

Trying to equate a FB score to this??????? 69-3 maybe?

Baseball score????? 30-0????????

-- Posted by shannonhoon on Sun, Jan 17, 2010, at 10:02 PM
Coco then in your expert opnion what should happen? All I've seen is you run these coaches down for beating a team this bad, but I haven't seen what you would do if you were the coach.

-- Posted by dexter_dad on Mon, Jan 18, 2010, at 12:21 AM
Obviously, some of you weren't at the game - and don't know all of the facts.

The girls team had not played a game since December 23rd (3 weeks)- they were sick and tired of practicing. Sadly, they were unable to play Kennett (a MUCH better team) on the 11th due to the tragic loss of a student. The energy that the girls came out with in the first quarter against Caruthersville was outstanding - we came out and pressed and played our aggressive 2-3 matchup zone defense - causing several turnovers. The coaches called off the press after the first quarter, and started substituting heavily in the second quarter.

In the third quarter, the coaches had the girls play a very non-aggressive, packed-in 2-3 zone, letting the Caruthersville guards throw the ball freely around the perimeter of the zone - where they would either throw it away, or dribble it off of their foot, or shoot and miss. We would then come down, pass and dribble the ball around the perimeter of their defense (TRYING to run time off the clock - check the box score by quarters) - but we would always have a girl come open under the basket for a lay-up. Now, being that our starters were sitting on the bench, are you going to tell a girl that gets little or no playing time that they are not to shoot the basketball?

I hate to say anything bad about the Caruthersville team, but the facts are they were PITIFUL and quit playing after the first quarter of the game. On Jan 6th, they lost 91-20 against Scott City (I tried to find more scores, but couldn't) so this wasn't their first, nor will it be their last, lop-sided loss.

Honestly, I wish we would've not played them at all - we have three very tough road games coming up this week, and we'll have to play our best to win - we needed our first game back from the lay-off to be competitive - and not a "cupcake".

-- Posted by ladycatdad on Mon, Jan 18, 2010, at 9:37 AM
coco, I understand and have deep appreciation for your stance on this matter. If I personally felt that the coach meant to demean or embarrass C'ville then I would be on your side 100%. My reason for mentioning the middle school girls was in an effort to prepare you for the fact that scores like these just may be the norm in the future.

-- Posted by robbincrosby on Mon, Jan 18, 2010, at 8:29 PM

Respond to this blog

Posting a comment requires free registration:

If you already have an account, follow this link to login
Otherwise, follow this link to register