The horrors of school statkeepers

ick. I had to do book and scoreboard for one varsity game this year - Person who normally did book was sick, and the visiting scorekeeper was some hack who got into a fight with an opposing scorekeeper a couple weeks ago, apparently. Luckily, the game wasn't close at all. I've been doing book and/or board for seven years, and it was still a lot to handle. I can't imagine doing clock and shot clock at the same time, or making a HS kid do it.

 

Not a bad idea. This school year, I've been sending out letters at the beginning of each season letting coaches know where to contact us, and having minimal success. Not to threadjack too much, anyone else do this?

 

Basketball box scores are fairly easy to do after a game or when a coach calls in.
Starting players are always the first five; then the subs who played. The subs are supposed to be in numerical order, but over the phone you sometimes dont have that luxury.

 

Yep. I sent out contact letters and a sample stat sheet to all the area coaches in the envelopes that I put their pre-season basketball questionaires. My results:
1) The closest rural school's girls' coach uses some sort of online program that produces a box score that gives me everything I need and he's always on time.
2) The closest rural school's boys' coach just gives me points for each player on both teams and score by quarters. Some nights, he doesn't even provide a quote. He sends after each game except after particularly bad losses and makes deadline about half the time.
3) Another girls' coach gives me all of his team stats but nothing for the other team and no score by quarters. Hasn't made deadline yet.
4) The third girls' coach started the year faxing copies of the scorebook (to the ad department's fax instead of the newsroom but he was making the effort) but always a day late. Sometime in mid-January, he quit and he hasn't answered an e-mail or returned a phone call. It seems to coincide with the fact that when his team started league play, they went on a 6-game losing streak.
Edit: Later in the month, his team went on a run as the 5 seed in the Regional tournament and qualified for State. Wouldja believe he started sending his stuff in again?
5) The other two boys' coaches do absolutely nothing for me at all.

So in general, one coach doesn't need the letter and all the others who did need the letter ignored it.

 

I covered a girls basketball game last week that ended regulation at 40-40. In the overtime, Team A won the jump and ball went straight to Team A's guard Jane Doe who quickly drove for an easy layup and a 42-40 lead. Each team added a free throw over the next four minutes, so Team A wins 43-41.

Next day I pick up the big city daily to which Team B's scorekeeper had obviously called in a brief account and stats. The brief started: "Team A's Jane Doe opened the overtime with a three-point basket to put Team A ahead for good . . . "

Once again, history is rewritten.

 

The state basketball tournament hits regionals this week.
I eagerly look forward to seeing all these kids who average 15 points, 12 rebounds and 10 assists hit 14, 6 and 3...

 

It happens way, way too often in field sports, not just basketball. Assists are credited when the possession doesn't lead directly to the goal, and you get goalies credited with 'saves' when the ball is shot way wide of the goal cage.

It was a field hockey game in New Jersey when I heard the statkeeper call out the word "save" when the ball was chopped towards goal and it fell short of the goal line, then when it was passed across the goalmouth, and again when it was bunted wide. In no way did a goalie make a save in that situation.

Thing is, scorebooks are what get sent into the NFHS for the purpose of updating national records. They're very important, but often left to the hands of rank amateurs! I've seen assistant coaches become statkeepers for things like clears, defensive takeaways, and "eliminations" -- instances when a player is able to beat her mark 1-v-1 with the ball and do something with it.

 

We had a coach of a bad basketball team (still with a fanatical following) who simply refused to give the players who played and did not score (only sent scores by fax). Also didn't give us shooting from the field. When we ran our area leaders, all of his kids who made it were credited with playing every game on the schedule, except ones we covered or got from an opposing team. And his players weren't eligible for FG percentage.
When parents called to complain, we just explained to them that the game reports we received did not say that they did not play, or how many shots they may have missed, and that the coach was welcome to report the proper corrections. Season's over. We're still waiting on the coach (who didn't even return our calls and emails for corrected information).

 

Thing is, the local major metro actually told us to only give the names of the players who scored this year. 0-0-0 was no longer an option.

My players probably don't like me, because I usually correct the stats off the film, and I'm a bit of a stickler for making sure they're right, so the player doesn't always get the steal if someone else does all the work and she just picks the ball up after her teammate stripped it and deflected it to her. I actually have gotten into arguments with people over whether one credits an assist if a player misses the shot, gets fouled in the act and hits a free throw (there are several coaches in our area who believe that to be an assist, I have to pull out the NCAA stat manual and read it to them chapter & verse).