Abuse in the name of winning
Clearly, Courtney's parents and I felt the coach's behavior was emotionally and physically abusive. What was disturbing wasn't so much that the coach and principal disagreed. It was that, because they wanted a winning basketball team (and felt most of the parents did, too), they felt they were somehow justified in doing whatever it took to achieve that objective, no matter the emotional, psychological or physical toll it would likely take on the players.
Is Courtney's story an extreme and unusual case? Neither. Sadly, it is the kind of story I hear virtually every day from concerned parents all across the country.
Yet, hopefully, it illustrates in a powerful way the kind of abuse that is too often condoned in today's "win-at-all-costs" youth sports culture, abuse that, simply put, has to stop.
Adapted from the book Home Team Advantage: The Critical Role of Mothers in Youth Sports (Harper Collins) by Brooke de Lench.
Brooke de Lench is a pioneer of child athlete safeguards and rights, a risk reduction in sports and legal consultant, Founding Executive Director of MomsTeam Institute, Inc., Producer of the documentary, "The Smartest Team: Making High School Football Safer" (PBS). Director of Smart Teams Play Safe, Publisher of MomsTEAM.com, and author of Home Team Advantage: The Critical Role of Mothers in Youth Sports (HarperCollins), and Brooke is also a founding member of the UN International Safeguards of Children in Sports coalition. She can be reached by email delench@MomsTeam.com, and you can follow her on Twitter @BrookedeLench,@MomsTeam and @SmartTeams
