How do you stop scoring

I think this is just stupid

Football coach, athletic director lose after 84-0 win in Northern California high school game (msn.com)

I have been on the losing side of a few lopsided scores such as 63 nothing in league play. Never once did any of us have a problem with the other team over it.

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In AFLW today, there was a score of 79-1 and 102-27. Nobody whining about it.

Just saw the article and it just sounds like a whiny opposition coach. Plus I notice there's no comeback on HIM for fielding an entire team of just 19 players - I guess the safety of his own players is worth less than whinging about a lopsided score.

Also, if it was starters running up the score all game I could understand the anger, but the wining coach clearly said he used the entire roster, so the last TDs will have been something like the 3rd-string QB passing to the 6th-choice WR - if you can't even defend against THAT, the problem is with you, not them.

What were the dominant side meant to do, exactly - spend the entire second half taking kneeldowns and punting so they didn't hurt anyone's feelings?

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I remember during the Trestman era
Montreal was beating someone by a large score
Very late in the game is was 3 and maybe 15 with Montreal in field goal range.

Rather than kick the field goal Trestman called a hand off where the rb pretty much did not even try for yards...It was an obvious mercy play.

Except to a couple fans of the losing team here
They accused Trestman of going for it in order to score another TD and continue to run up the score

Some people are never happy

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I’ve seen that with Bombers vs Ottawa running plays with backups on 3rd and long, if you score you are accused of running up the score?
Also happens in world hockey often.

Yeah I don’t think you can fault the backups for trying to score or defend.

I would draw the line at anything I consider to be over the top, such as two point converts, as per the original post. That doesn’t mean I would suspend someone for doing that. Maybe doing that repeatedly.

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It's not the winning team's fault that the opposition only has 19 dudes and is overmatched. If he played all 45 guys and gave them all reps, then the score doesn't matter. The only real issue would be if the 19 were physically overmatched to the point where it became clear that deliberate/avoidable injuries were imminent.

If you are playing 2nd and 3rd stringers then you have to give them full reps with the playbook. Your 2nd and 3rd stringers will likely never play meaningful organized football again after graduation. This is their chance to suit up and make some plays and have some memories. You can't put them in just to kneel.

As for going for 2 at 47-0 (which seems to be the sticking point) and the main crux of Mr Clark's decision (in his very own words), there are more than a few HS programs around that NEVER kick. They gamble on 4th every time and always go for 2. So big deal.

And if they actually were rubbing it in, SO F'n WHAT?? HS football is serious business. There are recruiters and scouts watching this tape, especially that of a dominant program. This is not house league intramurals. The kids are not 9 years old anymore and they have a very very narrow window to get noticed.

If the game was THAT lopsided, perhaps Mr Clark should put that 19-man squad in another division rather than suspend the winning coach. Now I never saw the game but it sure sounds like this Clark fellow just has a bleedy heart and a power trip sense of "justice".

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So I clicked through to the main newspaper article and read that and it seems opinion is fairly split over whether the coach deserved punishment or not - It's just the losing coach complaining the loudest who gets to be the main focus of the article.

Also, if his feelings were that hurt, surely there are options like a mercy rule or running clock? (I'm sure I've seen a running clock even in FBS vs. FCS blowouts - one of the SWAC teams?).

Regarding the excessive celebrations, there's absolutely no context. What if it was a player's first ever TD? What if it was someone WAY down the depth chart who usually hardly sees the field, but in this game actually scores? A player making his debut?

The Mercury article has attracted one whiny comment criticising a coach who has "no comprehension of sportsmanship". Call me cynical, but I have a strong feeling It's the Ygnacio Valley coach signed up under an alias...

-Contest was actually a league game which means they are in the same division.
-Ygnacio Valley was used to losing as they had lost 19 games in a row.
-Score was 56-0 at halftime.
-In the 2nd half, they did use a running clock.
-Ygnacio Valley accused College Park of using trick plays on 2-point conversions when they were already way ahead.
-College Park was penalized 4 times for excessive celebration.
-Superintendent Adam Clark did review the tape of the game and talked to both school principals before making a decision.
-Clark said he even if a team is shorthanded, he would rather have students involved in athletics as opposed to them possibly getting in trouble on the streets.

Unrelated to the story in this thread, but a local high school in my area is way worse as they probably have lost at least 100 consecutive varsity football league games in a mid-level division. Six teams in the league, and they play once a year. Do the math. Before anybody says they should change leagues, they are very competitive in basketball and often win league. In girls varsity basketball, they have won over 100 consecutive league games.

Why do they have to be in the same league in all sports? Keep basketball where it is and move football to a different league.

So they should be in a different division. The whole point of divisions in sports like this is for parity. As in some schools have 2000 students and have no problem finding 30 guys to suit up while others only have 800 students and have trouble getting 20 dudes into pads. So they have division A for big schools, division B for medium schools and division C for small schools that probably plays 8-man ball. If CP has 45 dudes and YV only has 19, then they shouldn’t be in the same league. That is not CP’s fault that their program is 3 times the size. The region should have these programs in different divisions.

So?

No context here. I’d have to see the cellys. Still, they lost 40-60 yards regardless.

I would hope so.

That’s irrelevant to the situation and his decision.

If the football program has difficulty fielding a competitive football team, they should think about changing football divisions/leagues. See above.

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Not practical.

Public school leagues are group together because of location/costs. That is not changing. The exceptions would typically be small private or religious high schools. If a team is good enough to make the playoffs, they are then arranged into divisions. Two teams from the same league could easily be participating in playoff games in different divisions.

I believe that was the game where Collaros was pulled for 3 plays because he took a hit to the head? The Bombers where heading for either a touchdown or the very least a field goal. Collaros went out, Brown went in and scored a touchdown. Is it a bad thing when a 3rd stringer goes into the game and wants to put points on the board?

In either 2019 or 2021 I forget which season it was, the Stampeders always went for a 2 point convert whether they where leading or trailing in the game. Didn’t hear anyone complaining that the Stamps where running up the score.

In the IIHF if the top 2 teams are tied win/lose, then goals matter. That’s why teams run the score up.

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I should’ve given a better time frame, I’m going back to Ottawa RoughRiders when they would win 3 maybe 4 games a year. Winnipeg won 60 something to 4, or something like that. Neverthewho, when you run the ball on 3rd 15 and still get a TD with backups, your not trying to run up the score.
But yes it happens all the time.

"In the IIHF if the top 2 teams are tied win/lose, then goals matter. That's why teams run the score up."

The strangest one for me is NCAA soccer where I've occasionally seen complaints about "running up the score", "poor sportsmanship" etc. when a team is 4-0 or 5-0 up.

Every league in the world OUTSIDE the NCAA (to my knowledge) uses goal difference as the first tie-breaker. You're rubbish and a team puts 10 past you? Tough, go and find a better defence and goalkeeper, or possibly coach.

True
But when the season is done, losing that game 84 to 0 or 35 to 0 is not going to make a difference

But if losing by that score bothers the team
Throw in the towel, concede the game
Go home and cry yourself to sleep

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It’s in California, the most populous state in the union, not East Bumhole Montana. Tons of schools and people around. Totally and perfectly practical.

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No, it is not practical.

Schools in the same league compete not just in football against each other, but in other sports and activities as well. In each sport, there are typically Varsity, Junior Varsity, and Freshman teams. School A's Varsity & Junior Varsity would go play at School B. School B's Freshman team would go play at School A. These are high school students who need to do homework, so they play teams closest to them. Moreover, schools in the same league are traditional rivals.

Schools in a particular league are not going to change because one of the teams is better or worse than the others.

During non-league or tournament games is where you see teams with more equal ability playing each other. This arrangement is done voluntarily by each school to fill up their schedule. Better teams play other better teams. Bad teams will play other bad teams just to have a chance at experiencing a win.

The only time the state gets involved in scheduling of games is for post-season play. As I said, this is when the teams are grouped and seeded into one of 6-10 different brackets depending on the sport. So, the state crowns about 6-10 different champions for each sport.

Neither the fact that one team is better than the other nor the score of a one-sided contest is even the main issue here in this thread. The concern here is whether proper sportsmanship was displayed by the winning team. I never saw the game, and neither did anybody else here. The superintendent did, so he would be a better judge of what happened in the game than you or me.

Not based on his comments. The summation he gave for his judgement stated no evidence to warrant such a heavy suspension whatsoever. He did not quote any official district rules nor policies that were violated. He simply gave a personal judgement of his own views on sportsmanship which are in the minority of most football people nationwide.

True, none of us saw the game, and more than one of us in this thread admits this. So I myself at least am solely judging his judgement based on HIS OWN comments in that judgement, and he fails - hard.

If Clark had said something like “this is the third or fourth time that CP has repeated this behavior after being warned that they were in violation of district sportsmanship policy, therefore in accordance with this policy and the previous warnings suspensions are handed out,” then I could totally accept that. BUT, he simply said,

This is simply his own self-imposed definition of sportsmanship. Sorry, that doesn’t wash one bit - and that in itself is poor sportsmanship - a bleeding heart sore loser.

So if you want to refute this, go find more quotes, the full written decision, or some game tape. Then get back to us.

How you interpret the situation is just your opinion. It is of no more value than anybody else's here. It certainly does not mean that you are correct.

I never even gave an opinion here of what I thought the correct response should be because I never saw the game.