Leading off today: Following up on an ongoing issue recently,
Newsday reported that four Long Island school districts continue to challenge the New York State Education Department over an edict requiring the abolition of mascots and nicknames tied to Native American tribes.
While nine districts in Nassau and Suffolk counties have announced new names and mascots or committed to do so before next school year to avoid measures including cutbacks to state funding, administrators at Wantagh, Wyandanch, Connetquot and Massapequa continue to push back with lawsuits for the right to keep their names.
When the Wantagh school district surveyed residents in 2023, about 54% of the respondents said the district should keep its name and imagery -- a profile of a Native American man with a feather -- while another 33.9% said just the name "Warriors" should remain. In the same survey, 73.7% of the respondents said the district should file a lawsuit against the state to keep the name.
According to the paper, the district has agreed to change its mascot but seeks to retain its name. Wyandanch is taking a similar approach in a bid to keep the Warriors name.
The more interesting disputes come from Connetquot (the Chiefs) and Massapequa (the Thunderbirds or T-Birds). They're suing to invalidate the statewide ban affecting public schools on the basis of constitutionality.
A spokesman for the state Education Department did not respond to the paper's request for comment.
Wantagh has already spent more than $61,000 to replace the middle and high school gym floors with a new "W" logo. School officials have estimated erasing the Warriors nickname and mascot will cost more than $650,000. Connetquot officials estimated a $323,000 hit to comply with the state ban.
Milestones
• Southampton boys basketball coach Herm Lamison earned career victory No. 500 on Monday with a win against Port Jefferson.
• North Warren boys basketball standout Semaj Cuyler crossed the 1,000-point mark on Wednesday night in a 74-42 victory over Fort Edward. While 1,000-point scorers are relatively common in high school basketball, what makes Cuyler's feat unusual is that he is only a freshman.
The 6-foot-2 guard helped lead the Cougars to the NYSPHSAA Class D title last season.
I didn't get around to mentioning it before going on a blogging break, but the Times Herald-Record's Stephen Haynes closed out 2024 by writing about Our Lady of Lourdes boys basketball coach Jim Santoro's recovery from
life-threatening close calls.
While recovering from a fractured ankle last summer, Santoro, 65, developed a septic infection that led to a two-month hospitalization. Doctors told him that the sepsis came perilously close to reaching his heart.
"By the time they figured out what was wrong, the infection took over my body," Santoro said. "I was in the bed and couldn't move. There were times the pain was so bad I didn't know if I even wanted to live."
Misgivings in West Virginia
Three West Virginia ADs told state lawmakers this week that they continue to have strong concerns about loosened
high school transfer rules.
During a hearing before the Joint Standing Committee on Education, the three expressed concern about juniors and seniors switching schools and leaving behind sophomores and freshmen to fill out rosters. They also questioned whether rural and impoverished communities are bound to fall behind schools in areas with greater advantages.
The 2023 rule revision allowed students to transfer schools at least one time and keep their athletic eligibility.
"We're seeing transfers and juniors and seniors basically to go join a better team or to win a state championship," said David Viands, AD at Jefferson County High School and president of the West Virginia Athletic Directors Association. "That sounds great for the schools accepting the student-athletes, but it does create disparity in schools that if you lose a lot of seniors and a lot of juniors, you're now playing freshmen and sophomores and you're playing against the school that these student-athletes went to."
Anecdotally, he cited statistics showing 159 football games shortened by running clocks in 2023 and 255 this past season.
