Tonight Coach Pat Summitt will attempt to achieve rarified status, winning her 1,000 game as a college coach.  To understand the achievement, the most wins by a men's college coach is Bob Knight, winner of 902 games at West Point, Indiana, and Texas Tech.  And she is only 56, young for a college coach.

How great is Summitt?  She personally has won more games than any other women's college program!  (Sounds like Babe Ruth when he hit more home runs in a season than some teams total home runs).  70 former players, assistant coaches, operation directors, graduate assistants or team managers are basketball coaches (and she spanks them too).  Since 1982 when the NCAA took over women's collegiate sports, her Tennessee teams have won 8 NCAA championships (and lost 5 others in the championship game).  They should just name the trophy after her.

To tie Summitt, a coach would have to average 25 wins for 40 years.  400 of her victories were against ranked teams.  And as a competitor, few, if any, are as intense.  She has had as great an effect upon the women's game as Coach John Wooden has on the men's game.  Her legacy, which is still being written, will demonstrate what Title was seeking to accomplish.

Simply put, Summitt is one of the greatest to ever coach the game of basketball.  Not female, mot male, not white, not black,  . . .  .  There are no qualifiers.  Very few, if any male players would want to stand toe-to-toe and challenge Coach Summitt.  Talk about coaches such as Bob Knight being intimidating.  And few, if many, are as knowledgeable.

She may not win in her attempt against #2 Oklahoma tonight.  But it's coming.  And probably a few hundred more.

This past Monday a Louisville, Kentucky high school football coach pleaded not guilty to a charge of reckless homicide when a 15 year old offensive lineman collapsed on August 20, 2008 after a sweltering practice that included running sprints, some with full gear on.  Coach David Stinson, in his first year as head coach, saw Max Gilpin collapse in the 94 degree heat.  Practice lasted 2 to 3 hours.  His body temperature rose to 107 and he never regained consciousness before he died three days later. 

Besides the criminal charges against Coach Stinson, a civil suit was filed against the school's coaching staff, accusing them of negligence and "reckless disregard".  Gilpin's health at the time of his death is part of the lawsuit.

Gilpin's mother has stated that her son was taking the dietary supplement Creatine for a time but stopped when practice began in July.  Creatine can cause cramps or muscle breakdown, heat intolerance and electrolyte imbalance according to the National Institute of Health.  It has not been stated whether Coach Stinson knew of Gilpin's use of the over-the-counter supplement, its effects, and if it may have caused or increased the severity of the situation.  His mother also says her son was taking medication (Adderall) for Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder.  School records confirm the school's knowledge of the medication.  It is unknown if the medication has any effect in heat stroke like conditions.

This case, if it goes to trial, has far reaching implications beyond high school football and the Kentucky borders.  If Coach Stinson is found guilty, coaches will potentially be criminally and civilly liable in all matters regarding coaching their players.  The boundaries may spread beyond what the court and practice field to all actions surrounding an event or game, both going to and coming from.    

Witnesses, among who are Gilpin's father, stated that the coach ran the players hard, including running "gassers".  Gassers are sprints up and down the field, until someone quits.  Peer pressure is an element that is used to create unity and reliance upon teammates.  Coach Stinson, himself an offensive lineman, played at the University of Louisville and then for the New York Giants. 

There are many more facts that will come out during the preliminary trial procedures that will have a great impact on this case.  Some questions that will have to be answered:

• With Coach Stinson having been a former Division 1 and NFL player, how aware of heat stroke and its elements is he?  Is he just a former player that is ill-equipped to be a coach?  What is his educational background that shows he knows the elements of physical education and coaching?
• Were water breaks allowed?  Were they periodic or were players allowed to get water when needed?  Is Coach Stinson aware of heat stroke and its causes?  Was he aware of the weather conditions on August 20 and the effects it could have on the players?  With the passing of Minnesota Viking Cory Stringer the year before and the considerable press it received (the NFL just settled with Stringer's wife last week), how could Stinson not be aware of the conditions that existed that day?
• Was he assisted on the field by an athletic trainer, and if so, was the athletic trainer certified.  Was the athletic trainer on the field at the time?  Was the athletic trainer monitoring the conditions and the players during practice?  Did the athletic trainer make the coach aware of the conditions?  If so, what did the coach do with the knowledge? 
• Was either the coach or athletic trainer aware that Gilpin was taking Creatine prior to the start of preseason conditioning? 

The fear that exists is that if criminal charges can be brought in a matter such as this for reckless homicide, where does the line get drawn for coaches.  Perhaps even more important is where do schools and organizations, such as AAU programs draw the line in who is qualified to coach young men and women.

• Will the AAU require coaches to be certified or be college graduates in a field related to coaching?
• Where does the line of responsibility get drawn for criminal charges against coaches?
• When they meet the players at the practice or event or sometime prior as the players are to make their own transportation arrangements even though it will fall under an official function?  Will the coach be responsible to be sure that each player is returned safely to a supervising adult?
• Will coaches no longer be able to push their players to achieve under physical, emotional or mental distress, elements that do exist late in games that are simulated in practice by use of various skill and conditioning drills?  If they are permitted to be used, will coaches have to demonstrate a knowledge proficiency in their application?
• How many non-certified coaches know of physical conditioning elements and how to apply them? 

The obvious concerns here are many.  Could a decision that holds a coach criminally liable scare off all the volunteer coaches and parents?  We all want are children to be supervised and learn properly, but we all want someone else to do it.  Will we now have to do it ourselves?

Raising the bar for the qualifications of coaches is not a bad thing.  There are enough want-to-be coaches out there that apply techniques they think are proper without understanding in full the ramifications.  For every coach that has his  or her team run sprints at the end of practice and then shoot free-throws there is another that uses the drill without understanding where the line of no return is.

Serious scrutiny will be made in the coming months with the death of Max Gilpin and the charge of reckless homicide against his coach.  Did Coach Stinson know the dangers of heat stroke and the signs of heat exhaustion (the condition preceding heat stroke)?  If he did (or even if he didn't - he should be aware of how it could feel being on the field himself as a former player) did he show a reckless disregard for their condition in order to condition them to adverse conditions (toughen them up), or just physically condition them?  Did he allow his players to get water or turn a blind eye to peer pressure to "tough it out"? 

Even if Coach Stinson is found innocent, this is a huge wake-up call to all coaches at all levels in all professional or volunteer capacities.  Knowing some of the individuals that presently are coaches on the amateur level, they may want to rethink their knowledge base or their involvement.  And if they leave, who amongst us will fill the void before teams and organizations close to avoid involvement in potential criminal proceedings, besides the insurance they take to protect themselves from civil suits.

Coaching is more than just a game.  Just ask David Stinson.  Game Over

Stephon just doesn't get it.  He's come out and stated that waiting in the wings for him, once his imprisonment to the Knicks is over, is a deal to make him a Boston Celtic.

Steph, stating that its not about the money and its a personal matter from the point of the Knicks is exactly how the Knicks view your approach.  If it is really that important for you to shed your shackles, takd the buy-out offer they have put on the table (a reported $2 million) and get on with your life and career.  Make the Knicks hurt everytime you see them and help the Green win back-to-back.  Revenge would be sweet.

In the movie The Great Escape, Steve McQueen plays the cooler king who escapes, and upon being capture spends time in isolation, "the cooler".  Steph, the difference between you and the Cooler King is you can buy your way out of MSG.  What are you waiting for?  The Knicks to cave.  Hate to break it to you, but they will wait until 1 minute after midnight on March 2, 2009 and then give you your release.  You'll be able to sign anywhere.  You just won't be eligible to play in the playoffs.  Which means that you will have almost no attraction to anyone up top, such as the Celtics.  They are in the playoffs.  They need a puzzle-solver that will be able to go in May and June, not hit the beach at the end of April.  Game Over.

Hall of Fame Coach Kay Yow of North Carolina State passed away earlier today.  What she has done off the court far outweighs her considerable acheivements on the court.

Most of you probably don't know of Coach Yow, watching more men's college basketball and the NBA.  Since 1987 Coach Yow has fought breast cancer, defeating it twice.  The message she has given to all in her perserverance is remarkable.  If you have a daughter or neice, Coach Yow would be one of the people you would want her to emulate.

The first reaction to this weeks events surrounding NY Knick Center Eddie Curry would be something like, "here we go again".  Allegations of sexual harassment and racial discrimination by his former driver harkens back to former VP, GM and Knick coach Isiah Thomas and MSG being sued (and won by) former MSG VP Anucha Brown Sanders on sexual harassment charges.  That suit cost MSG $11 milllion dollars, face, and opened the door to what appears to be a routine right out of Looney Tunes.

There we have Bugs and Daffy arguing whether it was duck or rabbit season in front of Elmer Fudd.  The thing that they didn't get was that Elmer didn't care which season it was, one of the two was in season.  And now, so is every Knick.

It's bad enough that Curry is here and not contibuting (we'll discuss the off court matters in this discussion and leave the woeful Isiah Thomas trade to acquire Curry to another discussion).  The coaching staff and management have been doing every thing they can to get Curry back on the court so he can demonstrate his talent so that he can then be traded in order to gain even more cap room to make runs at multiple players in the summer of 2010 (think LeBron James AND Chris Bosh).  As tough as it is trying to trade Curry when he has not been able to perform due to injury, his onerous contract makes it that much more difficult.  Adding charges such those that are alleged has just about killed the Knick's hope to trade him.

Finally, on its surface, its tough to accept the charges his former driver alledges.  Having been around professional and collegiate athletes and know how they interact off the court, Curry's teammates were very quick to defend their teammate when, especially on what has been considered a very fractured lockerroom, their first inclinatin would be to run into the trainer's room to avoid such questions.  It's also interesting, though it certainly not going to create a defense, that Curry is happily married and has four children.  Not that being married and having children necessarily will bar bi-sexual activity, it just would seem to diminish its liklihood.  Curry's allegder also has a criminal history.

It also speaks volumes, unlike when allegations of steriod use of former NY Yankee Roger Clemens, that Curry is going to immediately file a defamation lawsuit.  His former driver is now going to have to prove his charges, and if he doesn't, pay for smearing his name.

This situation is of primary concern to the NBA offices and team managements when they look at the players and their posse's.  Unlike an episode of Entourage, what happens when someone who is a friend of a player is put on his personal payroll and later falls out of favor and is let go?  What happens if that person does not have an education that would allow them to get another job that will pay as well as the one of being a member of the posse, one that willl allow him to live the type of lifestyle that he has become accustomed.  What happens if there is bitterness mixed in with the fact they have bills piling up, and, most importantly, knows intimate details of the palyers life?  This is the fear management has, that allegations such as these now reflect poorly upon the product and poorly upon the team.

We hope the allegations are false.  First for Eddie's sake, and second for the Knick's sake.  Someone needs to take down the Open Season sign and tell the Elmer Fudds' of the world to just go back and crawl in a hole.

Game Over.

In an article in today's NY Times, Harvey Araton says that New York City is no longer the land of point guards - Click Here For Article.

Truth is, its an Urban Myth.  One created by New Yorkers, who have had the pleasure of calling the Knicks World Champions a total of two times in their "glorious" history.  And who led the Knicks to those two championships? - Clyde Frazier.  Somewhere along the way, New Yorkers, as they are wont to do, began the boast of producing the best point guards in all the land.

In his article, Araton lists several products of the streets of New York.  In no particular order: Stephon Marbury, Sebastian Telfair, Kenny Anderson, Pearl Washington, Kareem Reid, Omar Cook, Erick Barkley, God Shammgod, Rafer Alston, Mark Jackson, Lenny Wilkens, Bob Cousy, and Nate "Tiny" Archibald.  Between all of them they account for 121 years of NBA playing experience.  Between them, they have collectively lead their teams to a grand total of 7 NBA titles (Cousy 6, Archibald 1).  These are the great leaders that we are so proud of?

Yeah, but no one handles or are better showmen than the ballers that come from the Public and Catholic school systems in New York.  We'll be sure not to look at NBA highlight films of Magic and Isiah (East Lansing and Chicago, respectively).  And each of them led their teams to multiple championships.  And when it comes down to it, if we wanted to be boastful of producing the best at something, the true measure of a point guard, unlike anyother position in professional sports other than quarterback, is now many championships they have led their teams to.

Araton's error in his analysis was starting his evaluation of the decline of New York City point guards by following the urban myth that it even existed.  Game Over.

On January 15, 1891, the 13 Rules of Basketball was first published, thus publicly creating the game that we all play.  Dr. James Naismith created the game for his unruly physical education class that was stuck inside in the cold Massachusetts winter.  The game originally called for nine men aside and shooting into a peach basket set 10 feet high.

The game has evolved quite a bit over the past 119 years.  Unlike America's other two "popular" sports of baseball and football, this game is truly American in origin (Baseball from foundations of Rounders, and Football has beginnings of Rugby).  It is arguably the second most played and watched sport in the world, behind soccer. 

The game can be played anywhere and by anyone, the only required access is to a ball and a hoop.  For those of us that know, an empty garbage can in the schoolyard also makes a good substitute basket.  Careers of all kinds have been created and devoted to the game, from players to coaches, architects that design arenas to vendors that sell popcorn, colleges that build cash-cow programs to NCAA office pools, from television contracts that go into the billions of dollars to licensors that sell authentic uniforms to the masses.  To the very existence of this web site.  It can all be traced back 119 years ago this week.  Thankfully Naismith was a physical education teacher and not a dance instructor.  Game Over.