SC Soccer Forums SCSoccer.com Forums Girls Varsity Soccer Does West Ashley have to forfeit?

You are right Hammer. All hell shall break loose and the world will never be the same. Soon teams will use 19 players on the field, all dressed in helmets and armed with AK-47's. Calls that are disputed will quickly be eliminated...literaly. Even PA announcers will fall prey to the new law, instantly becoming aware of any mispronounciations in rosters via home town snipers. "Anything goes" is the correct label and just like you said, chaos will surely follow.

Sarcastic side aside now, do we think we may have embellished the potential outcomes here? A little?

Colafan&talon-

I don't see how you can say that the board members simply allowed WA to win. I think that with the statement "anything goes" that is what you mean. I don't know if you were at the appeal meeting, but I was. John Harrel did an excellent job of finding the rules and proving that WA did not violate them. The rules are very specific and that is how they should be viewed. I am glad that the board realized how specific these rules are and also the fact that WA didn't do anything wrong.

-sh8

Something similar happened to my sons club team once. We were petitioned out of a torunament after a red carded coach met the team away from the field during half time. We got taken out of the tourney because the coach was a dummy.

The problem here is the coach - and his stupidity. Assuming he read the rule book - which seems a stretch - even having these two 8th graders on the bench in street clothes and not listed on the roster was JUST PLAIN DUMB !!! But to put them in uniform and list them on the roster - how idiotic can you get. The two 8th graders should have been at the game, in the stands, in street clothes, bought their own tickets and maybe if they are lucky they ride the team bus.

The WA girls won the game without the 8th graders so they won the game. What the high school league should have done was what they did. Plus fine the coach $1,000 and reprimand him for being overly stupid.

Great article about WA in the Post and Courier by ken Burger, well written and covers some major points about this whole mess.

so who all gets the win in the outsome

Reading through some of these posts has been an interesting experience. Let alone the idea that a team would violate a rule through the playoffs. What are high school sports coming to? It is a sad day when an attourney has to be hired because of a state championship. Lets get real, if ones' team was in violation of a rule, it should have been enforced. If it means the forfeit of a state title, then so be it. The message that was sent, I think, was the wrong one. When I ref games next year, you can be assured that if you don't have matching uniforms, you aren't going to play. I don't care if it means if you have different color tape on your socks...guess what, you are going to go change it to make everyone conform. I hope that they understand that the refs can become extremely harsh when it comes to the rules.
My other question is why would the SCHSL bend to the pressure being put on them this year, when it was proven that the spirit of a rule was broken. Last year, Irmo took it up the you know what. And the Irmo game showed that the time went way too long? Lets have some consistency by the SCHSL. They are just digging themselves into a hole that they won't be able to get out of.
And the parents should be ashamed of themselves for hiring a lawyer. School sports are about, or should be about, having a good time, and learning teamwork. This is not the time to teach the children that if you don't get the decision you want, take the poeple that you disagree with to court. This is a sickness in America. And the kids of today are learning from their parents that they aren't responsible for their own actions...it is always somebody elses fault. What a great example to set, but then again, most parents now-a-days are like that themselves. Too self absorbed to ever consider that something might be their fault. This makes me proud to see this going on even at the high school level. Keep it up, it will make high school sports just that much more enjoyable to play.

Somehow it just seemed right to end this topic on post #144 (a gross of posts) by Edisto00 with the enigmatic question "so who all gets the win in the outsome?" But then Soccerboy had to go and stretch things out by another post. Oh well. Like a moth to a flame as another lowcountry poster said this year...

Soccerboy --

Unlike the CA Johnson and Marlboro county challenges to the SCHSL last school year, West Ashley did not go to court and try to overrule the authority of the SCHSL to establish eligibility rules and/or enforce them. The attorney (John Harrell, Esq) was not "hired". He donated his time and effort free of charge to help serve the interests of the community in which he lives. The SCHSL's bylaws allow for appeals of adverse decisions, and after Mr. Matthews ruled the championship should be forfeited, West Ashley asked for the matter to be appeaed to the Executive Committee, in accordance with the SCHSL's own rules.

The Executive Committee heard both sides of the case and decided (by a 5-4 vote) that their rule regarding 8th grade participation in HS soccer had not been broken. They did not fail to enforce their rule or "bend to pressure" as you say. They decided their rule had not been broken. (Repeat after me "the rule was not broken".) West Ashley's case hinged partly on a clear lack of intent to play the 8th graders, but more on a very precise definition of what constitues a uniform in soccer. Mr. Harrell persuaded a majority of the Executive Committe that they had to follow their own explicit rules in defining uniform. Case closed.

I think this whole affair can be looked upon as a triumph of the SCHSL's rules and its ability to enforce them. West Ashley never tried to blame anyone else for their mistakes and their coach was clear before the Executive Committee that he was responsible for the decision to let the 8th graders sit on the bench. But their decision must be respected, and it stated that the participation rule was not broken. I don't see how you can come down so hard against a system where someone is presumed innocent until proven guilty, then released when the duly appointed jury listens to the evidence and decides there was no crime. Isn't that how we do things in America?

Finally, if you do happen to ref games next year and there is a rule that uniforms should be uniform, then you should enforce it. That's why we have rules.

lpaf

Soccerboy --

I can't resist reflecting here for a minute on your comment "it was proven that the spirit of a rule was broken". From the very begining of this I have maintained that the spirit of the rule regarding participation of 8th graders in soccer had to be considered in this case (though not everyone agrees on this). The spirit or intent of these rules is to protect younger and smaller players from injury in a contact sport. From that perspective, West Ashley always had the moral high ground -- the 8th graders weren't needed and had no chance of playing. The letter of the rule was where the rub came. Was an 8th grader in JV uniform technically breaking the rule if present in the bench area? The Executive Committe finally said "No" to this.

Now, if you take it one step further, you could argue that the letter of the rule also has its own spirit, and that spirit could be that "uniforms is uniforms" and the 8th graders were yelling and all and maybe that's why West Ashley won the championship game, not because they outlasted Mauldin or had better defense, speed and aggressiveness in the overtime periods of the game.

From this perspective, it can be argued that West Ashley didn't break the spirit of the rule or the letter of the rule. They may, however, have been guilty of breaking the spirit of the letter of the rule that they didn't break to begin with.

lpaf

postscript:

1) The West Ashley coaching decision to sit JV uniformed 8th graders on the bench of the best girls HS soccer team in the state of SC during playoffs will always be regarded as one of the most boneheaded decisions ever made by a HS coach. Great coaches. Dumb, dumb, dumb decision.

2) The answer to the question in the title of this particular topic is "no".

3) I'm still pondering Edisto00's query from post 144, "so who all gets the win in the outsome?" She's on to something there somewhere. I think.

lpaf

laplageauxfolles,

I understand your position and hope you can enlighten me on the following questions (my legal background intrigues me) --

1) Did the 8th graders play in any playoff games?

If so, that's a direct violation of the rules and those games should have been forfeited before the championship.

2) Can you explain the allegations regarding a certain West Ashley mother making sure the coaching staff (McNeely/Cuthill) placed her 8th grade daughter on the varsity squad for the playoffs and championship to gain valuable Big Game experience and support her older sister;

If so, had these coaches been familiar with the rules they could have easily nixed her demand of this proposal.

3) Where has the Coach been in this entire process and why has he never commented?

It seems to me that his hiding from these accusations only implies that he knows he has cheated and simply wants this episode to be behind him.

4) This reminds me of the old "duck-and-cover" commercials of the 1960s in which the threat of nuclear war was imminent with the Soviet Union during the Cold War. The PSAs of the day advocated that when you saw the flash to seek refuge against a wall/ditch to hide from the blast (a seemingly WAHS tactic during this saga).

Seems to me that the "old Middleton" guard has simply changed its colors, but not its' stripes!

5) What's the future of this program? Are the suitors and traitors to return next year? Can legal action bail this group out again? Inquiring minds want to know!!!