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Will Dawn Staley ever outgrow Geno? Lisa Leslie weighs in.
In an interview with Sports Serious, WNBA legend Lisa Leslie shared her opinion that South Carolina’s Dawn Staley has the best program in women’s college basketball.
America today
In a three-year span, Texas Tech has investigated four coaches for alleged abuse of athletes: women’s basketball coach, softball coach, women’s tennis coach and now men’s basketball coach Mark Adams.
The first three coaches left the school. Adams is currently suspended but will almost never coach another game at Texas Tech for misusing a ridiculous Bible verse. cool. Easy decision. What makes you feel good.
Four coaches have disappeared due to abuse of players. Currently, the school only has 13 full-time head coaching staffs. Which means – excuse me while I do the math here … divide it into two and take one – nearly a third of Texas Tech’s head coaches over the past three years at various points have either resigned or, in the Adams case, could be lost due to player abuse charges.. That must be some kind of ground speed signal.
“It’s a very serious situation,” said Jonathan Katz, a sports psychologist who served as the sports psychology consultant to the University of Texas men’s and women’s tennis teams in 2022. I don’t think anyone can ignore that.”
More: Schedule, bracket and storylines for the unknown ACC men’s basketball tournament
That was a year ago. It got worse. The school may want to explore granting the athletic director a permanent leave of absence.
Texas Tech is firmly in the 21st century with a world record for not understanding today’s athlete. In today’s world where respect and decency are important, racism, verbal abuse and treating players like robots is unacceptable. Maybe Texas Tech will find it in the 22nd century.
But there is a bigger lesson here than just getting someone’s Bible verse wrong. It’s a lesson that applies not just to college sports, but to all sports and careers. The lesson is, essentially, that people are done taking your bullblips.
Well, no yours BS in particular, but bulllips in general. Athletes are being treated like robots. People of color have experienced some of the most racist acts in the world. Workers ended up not being paid a living wage. I think there’s a general sense of weariness and frustration among many people about what’s happening in the country (and probably the world): the tyrannical politicians, the extremism, the rich getting richer. Wars and strong men. Loss of personal rights.
If you don’t think this Texas Tech story is a big part of that, you haven’t been paying attention.
More and more people are done.
I think after Adams said what he did, the anonymous player said: I will not be patient again. You’re a grown man, coach, you should know better. You should have put in the work and you didn’t.
This is not the 1950s. Bobby Knight, thankfully, didn’t go through that door.
Assistant Corey Williams is the interim head coach for this week’s Big 12 Conference Tournament, but Adams likely won’t be back. He was suspended Sunday for “…use of inappropriate, unacceptable and racist comments last week,” according to a news release from the school.
More: Texas Tech’s Mark Adams was suspended for the Big 12 Tournament. Assistant Corey Williams was named interim coach
More: New NCAA President Charlie Baker talks student-athlete hires, Neal rules
“Adams was encouraging the student-athlete to become more receptive to training and quoting Bible verses about workers, teachers, parents and slaves serving their masters,” the press release said.
Today’s athletes, especially athletes of color, are less inclined to remain silent on issues like Texas Tech One because they’ve seen other players like Colin Kaepernick and LeBron James use their superpowers to address social justice issues. There is less fear to do this.
Young players have seen Kaepernick stand up to systemic racism by law enforcement, and instead of worrying about suffering Kaepernick’s fate — he’s basically been banned from the NFL — I believe many have been inspired by his bravery.
After George Floyd was killed Doug Baldwin, a key member of the 2020 player protest movement, told Seahawks.com in February why it was important for him to speak out in support of Kaepernick.
“I can’t sit around and do nothing about what’s going on in our country,” Baldwin said. “Or at least from a point of view or an angle where I think I can influence it in some way.”
Some college programs understand this phenomenon. Some want to stay stuck in the past. Texas Tech seems like an institution that will never get it.
Again and again.
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