sunday's fanspeak

Coach has no excuse

I AM so sick and tired of reading comments like the one that appeared in your Sports page on March 14. To quote you, "Sure, Bob Knight still gets fired often. A college coach can't turn around a college basketball without yelling occasionally." That's bull. I teach seventh-grade students how to write sentences. I teach them about nouns, pronouns, adjectives and so on. They're not there because they want to be. They're under force and under duress, so to speak. But if I raised my voice at the classroom, I'd be getting in trouble. If a regular classroom teacher behaved in a manner that a coach behaved, they would be fired. And remember, the kids they have the teams are out there because they want to be there. They should be the most easily motivated students in the world. If you can't motivate kids that want to be there without screaming, cursing and having a temper tantrum, you belong in another profession.

Congratulations, ND

CONGRATULATIONS TO the Bulldogs of Notre Dame High School. These girls worked very hard. Congratulations ladies and seniors. Thank you for four great years.

No Mizzou boxscore?

DECENT COVERAGE this morning of the Tigers' big opening round victory yesterday, but where's the boxscore? I can understand if they played late, but this was a morning contest. Real fans want to see the stats, without having to log on to ESPN.

Editor's note: Basketball boxscores from Mizzou and other schools may be added to our sports section next season.

Frustrated by changes

MY WIFE and I have been fans of the Kelly High athletic program for years. I have never seen such a negative turn in an athletic program. Some of the boys no longer seem to care about sportsmanship. Some of the things I have heard them say or the lip-reading I have been able to do should be very embarrassing to the school. I have been told there have been fights between players. Last year's varsity team was 13-12. The same group won 20 or more games on junior varsity. This year the varsity was 8-16. When these boys were JV they won 14 or 15 games. Not a very good trend.