HARTFORD, Conn. -- High school football coaches in Connecticut will have to be good sports this fall -- or risk a suspension.

The football committee of the Connecticut Interscholastic Athletic Conference, which governs high school sports, is adopting a "score management" policy that will suspend coaches whose teams win by more than 50 points.

A rout is considered an unsportsmanlike infraction and the coach of the offending team will be disqualified from coaching the next game, said Tony Mosa, assistant executive director of the Cheshire, Conn.-based conference.

"We were concerned with any coach running up the game. There's no need for it," Mosa said. "This is something that we really have been discussing for the last couple of years. There were a number of games that were played where the difference of scores were 60 points or more. It's not focused on any one particular person."

Some have dubbed it the "Jack Cochran rule," after the New London High football coach, who logged four wins of more than 50 points last year. In New London's 60-0 rout of Tourtelotte/Ellis Tech, Cochran enraged the Tourtelotte bench by calling a timeout just before halftime. Tourtelotte's coach was arrested on breach of peace charges after police say he struck a security guard and an assistant New London coach.

Leo Facchini, New London's athletic director, called it unfair to single out his coach.

Facchini said he and Cochran tried to pull in the reins during New London's 90-0 drubbing of Griswold last season by trying to get both sides and the timekeeper to agree to run a continuous clock.

Some states, including Iowa, continuously run the game clock in the second half if a team has a 35-point lead. The Connecticut committee rejected a similar proposal because members thought it would unfairly cut into backups' playing time.

I'm failing to see the point about what's stupid with this... Suspending a coach for allowing (encouraging?) his/her team to run up the score, or letting the clock run when a lead is by so many points... I believe there are a couple states that have the running clock in basketball, as well.

Which begs my question: What are the coaches (and parents, for that matter) teaching their kids? That it's acceptable to win at all cost and to demoralize their opponents, which is the last thing anyone needs at the age of development.

There's nothing worse than getting one's nose rubbed in it (myself being at both ends of this), which is why there's the "mercy killing" rules in H.S. and Little League Baseball and softball, and wrestling (worst drubbing in a match I was witness to was 40-3)

I, for one, am all for it.

What I see as stupid about this is 2 things...

1. It's quite vague. I can see this rule if starters are left in past the 3rd quarter, or a 28 or 35 point lead.

2. Why not do like Nebraska 8-man...45 point mercy rule?

I definitely don't believe in running up the score with your starters, but what do you do with your backups and beyond...take a knee, run backwards, don't block, fumble, throw interceptions....???? Those backups and younger guys need playing time too...running and passing. I say take out your starters after a respectible lead(you can put them back in when that lead is threatend), or implement the mercy rule.

That's like penalizing a wrestling coach for allowing his kid to tech-fall someone. The tech fall is in place for that very reason...if one wrestler is dominant enough to better his/her opponent by 15 points or more without being able to secure the pin...hence the tech fall(mercy rule). The losing coach also(in some states) has the option of throwing in the towel and ending the game early.

Bottom line is, you can't tell kids not to try...but a coach who leaves in his/her starters to run up the score, rub it in, or for revenge should be penalized and punished for it.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Red Rocker,

I have to respectfully disagree with you on this one Mikey. First let me ask you, have you ever been involved in a game where you have been beaten by that many points? I have, several times, I believe my sophomore year we played Wahoo Neumann and they put 35 points on us in the first quarter, let me tell you it was ugly ugly ugly.

Notice now we have the tech-fall rule instilled for wrestling. This makes sure that things don't get out of hand in matches and kids don't get even more embarassed. I have been involved in games where our starters weren't as good as a team's reserves and sometimes their 3rd string kids. Teams never intentionally ran up scores on us, but they did their best not to get things out of hand way too quickly.

There are times and places where a thrashing is good, you learn a lot more from losing than you do winning. At the same time, consistently losing, and consistently being embarassed on the field/mat/court is not what athletes in general want to keep experiencing. As a football player, it was harder each and every time to go to school on Mondays after a humiliating loss.

Like I just said on Sports Nightly(heh heh), in 8-man football we only have 15-20 kids per practice and it makes it tough to run effective scrimmages. The team that I coach was up quite a bit a few times last year, and we got our freshmen and sophomores a lot of playing time. Now when those guys play this year, they will have game experience.

I like the 45-point rule, or if we are going to continuous clock when one team gets up 35, so be it. I don't like an across-the-board rule that says the coach will be suspended if they get up 50.

Here is what the rule amounts to: Make sure the back-ups play, just not well. If the score is too high, and a kid gets to the goal line, instuct him to stop before he crosses it- "In the name of sportsmanship, FALL DOWN!" Right. That move truly does show respect for the opponent. I thought the rules in wrestling penalized a wrestler for releasing an opponent from a pinning position because that is considered unsportsmanlike. NSAA socialism run amuck.

Don't pin all your issues with the rules on the NSAA... National Federation of State High School Associations (NFHS)is the driving force behind a majority of the rules..

dswitz - If the wrestler releases his opponent from a pinning position and backs away... That presents the appearance of showing up the opponent and is construed as unsportsmanlike. Allow him to base first, then cut... Looks better.

Anarchist a/k/a NSAA fan: That's what I thought the rule meant; backing away from a total finish is showing up the opponent. So to apply that rationale to football would be to allow a team to completely finish and devastate another team, not back away when that team is on the ropes; same in boxing, knock the opponent completely out, don't carry him- unsportsmanlike you know.

Anarchist-Are you gonna be the one who has to tell the underclassmen, who only get to play when the game is out of hand, that they shouldn't try their best when they are on the feild. That they need to fail on purpose because their team is too successful and we need to level the playing field.

Try, but don't try too hard is a heck of a lesson to teach a bunch teenagers.

Punishing a coach because they did their job well is plain unconsionable.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Angrybilly,

that is sort of similar to the flagfootball league i'm in. they go off nat'l rules. basically if yer up by 45+pts in the 1st half the game is called(mercy rule) and 25+ after the 2 min warning at the 2nd half. this helps keep teams from getting 25 ptr'd every game.(it still happens, there is one team that is 0-6 and have been beat by 30+ everygame....these are not kids they are college kids to grown men that play).


yeah for them to get in trouble is rediculous for running up the score. install a mercy rule or something, but make it a nation wide rule, just not because this one team is so great, lol.

i'm sorry but if i had a team good enough i wouldnt just hand over the bal to the other team if we are up that much. i would put in my 2nd team and some 3rd.

Why are we as a society so enamored with making people feel good themselves? The great thing about sports is they teach lessons that can easily translate into real life. Being a team player, winning and most importantly-losing. What happens when these kids get out into the real world and they realize that there is no mercy rule? Last I checked the world doesn't stop because something doesn't go your way-you fight through it and move on. This is just one more step in the pussification of America. We're crippling these kids, crippling them for life. Its not a wonder our society today is as screwed up as it is.

The only thing it teaches HB is that when you get out into the "real world" and things don't go your way, you sue the pants off of the offender.

I forgot that this is the land of the double standard... A 40-point Husker win is unacceptable, but a team that hangs 70 on the board against the Huskers is construed as running up the score and is unconscienable.

Kids get crippled for life when they get whipped so badly, they get discouraged and are afraid to try

Extracurricular activities should be used to help build their confidence.

I'll concede that losing builds character, but continued demoralization by 50+ point losses destroys confidence. angrybilly - are you going to be the one who has the arduous task of attempting to rebuild the confidence of the demoralized youth and encouraging them to get back in the game?

Likewise, continuous destruction with 60 and 70 point wins doesn't teach anything positive, either. It teaches and encourages arrogance, over-inflated egos, and poor sportsmanship. The one thing I hate worse than a sore loser is a sore winner. A sore winner, you ask? That is an individual/team who thrives on the big point spread, demoralizing victories, accepting nothing less, then turns around and rubs the victim's face in it (as if running up the score isn't enough).

dswitz - are you so blinded by being anti-NSAA that you don't see the bigger picture of where the guidance may come from? The objective in wrestling is to earn the pin, or outpoint your opponent in the alloted time. The objective in boxing is to knock the opponent out or outpoint them in the alloted time, not continue to beat them to a bloody pulp so badly that the opponent is nothing more than a drooling idiot for the rest of his natural life. Likewise, the objective in any other sport is to outpoint your opponent in the alloted time. Can this be done without showing them up? Yes, it can... An unfortunate oxymoron to this equation is individual sports where team scores are kept, e.g., wrestling, track, golf, tennis.

Society has placed such a strong emphasis on winning and losing at such a young age that we forget that the real objective is to teach the child life skills, build confidence, and encourage them to be productive members of society.

If your kid is so psychologically devastated from a loss in an amateur sporting event that he/she can't be a productive member of society, then I believe that speaks more to your ability to be a good parent. I have a hunch you have a sort of liberal ideology anarchist. Just a hunch.

I agree with HB, This Is STUPID

I've been in games where the coach was standing on our sideline, hoping that our reserve runningback would get tackled when he busted one up the middle. Sometimes teams aren't trying to run up the score, it just happens. And odds are that if a team has gotten beaten once by 50+ points, they've had it happen several times, so it shouldn't "psychologically damage" them at all, granted it's not much fun.

"Why are we as a society so enamored with making people feel good themselves? The great thing about sports is they teach lessons that can easily translate into real life. Being a team player, winning and most importantly-losing. What happens when these kids get out into the real world and they realize that there is no mercy rule? Last I checked the world doesn't stop because something doesn't go your way-you fight through it and move on. This is just one more step in the pussification of America. We're crippling these kids, crippling them for life. Its not a wonder our society today is as screwed up as it is."

Amen, HB...

Um, doesn't wrestling have a mercy rule?

I think if a team wins by 50+ points then they should just have to move up a class the next year.

Anarchist-In response to your question if I would want to be the one to rebuild a kids confidence after a big time loss, yes I would. I say yes, assuming I am a coach in that situation, because it is part of the coaches job to respond when the morale of his team gets low. Be it from a big loss or some other circumstance.

Coaches are expected to instill a certain amount of mental toughness in there players. That means that coaches need to prepare their players not only for the wins, but also the losse. Especially the big losses.

Anarchist what you, and the CIAC, are promoting does nothing to increase the confidence or decrease the disappointment of the teams that are involved the long run. I contend that it does the exact opposite it installs a false sense of security and entitlement. These misguided attempts at leveling the playing field will lead to serious disapointments down the line.

Mark my words.

Wrestling did not always have a 15-point technical fall. And its also much different than a team sport like football or basketball.