Leading off today: Just six wins away from 200 for his career, LeRoy football coach Brian Moran has given himself a deadline for achieving the milestone.
Speaking at the Section 5 school's annual football banquet Sunday, Moran announced that the 2014 season with be his 26th and last on the job with the Oatkan Knights, TheBatavian.com reported.
"At the end of next year, I'll be 55 and I'll have either coached or played since I was 12," Moran said. "When we hired Brian Herdlein, we had a conversation with him as a district about taking over for me. He's been in the program long enough and it just feels like it's time for him to take over the program."
Moran's 1995 team won a NYSPHSAA Class C championship.
Notice of claim filed: The parents of the Section 6 football player who died last fall after collapsing during a game have filed a notice of claim against Westfield Academy and Central School, reserving their right to file a civil suit at a later date, The Buffalo News reported late Monday.
Damon Janes, 16, was forced to take the field wearing a substandard helmet and should have been pulled from the contest because he was visibly hurt, parents Dean Janes and Penny Gilbert said in the legal filing.
Initial reports had Damon suffering a serious helmet-to-helmet collision during the Westfield/Brocton team's loss at Portville on Sept. 13, but the paper said other theories have emerged, including that a serious blow to the head in the prior week's game at Randolph left Janes vulnerable to a life-threatening hit in a later contest.
But the family's filing goes further, alleging Westfield failed to monitor Janes "between games when it was apparent he had suffered an injury" and failed to examine him at the season's start to establish a baseline for his balance and brain function. New York does not mandate such baseline tests but does require that players who are believed to have suffered a concussion immediately sit out and resume play only when symptom-free for at least 24 hours.
Westfield Superintendent David J. Davison refused to talk about any of the accusations when contacted by The Buffalo News on Monday. The district has rejected the paper's request to view videos of 2013 season football games, citing the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act -- a federal law generally applied to academic records.
"That's ridiculous," said Robert J. Freeman, executive director of the State Committee on Public Access to Records. "You are talking about film during a game, during which hundreds or maybe thousands of people were present? No -- doesn't make sense."
Chant crosses the line: Pittsford has withdrawn from the finals of the 2014 Battle of the Fans Competition conducted by the state's largest high school sports governing body after an embarrassing video surfaced Monday.
"Regretfully, one of our student sections made a bad choice in the selection of a cheer this past Friday," district officials said in a letter to the New York State Public High School Athletic Association. "While we have addressed the issue as a school district, we still feel it is in the best interest of everyone for us to pull out of the contest. We look forward to possibly entering in the future."
Pittsford was one of four finalists in the first-year NYSPHSAA competition intended to promote positive behavior by student fans at athletic contests. The events during a Jan. 24 boys basketball game between Pittsford Sutherland and Brighton made the district's continued
