Leading off today: Garden City has moved both into the Long Island Championship game and to the top of the list for longest active winning streaks in high school football.
The latter distinction fell into the Trojans' lap over the weekend after they defeated Long Beach 27-12 in the Nassau Conference II championship game and an Ohio small-school powerhouse finally toppled after 76 straight victories.
Garden City's Angelo Cupani scored on a 12-yard run with 56 seconds to play to wrap up the program's 10th straight Section 8 championship and 65th consecutive victory.
Garden City, 11-0 this fall, plays East Islip in the Long Island Class II championship game Saturday at Stony Brook University.
In Ohio, St. Henry pulled off a 24-7 victory over Marion Local, the top seed in the state's Division VII Region 28 playoffs. The 15-time state champions had struggled in the latter half of the regular season with a trio of one-point wins.
A very strange weekend nationally
While there's always ample New York material to choose from on the high school sports scene (I'll be posting some of it in another blog later Wednesday), the last week has seen some truly wild news -- aside from the Ohio school's winning streak ending -- from around the country.
Easily the most intriguing story is the one out of Big Stone Gap, Va., where the head coach of an undefeated football team has disappeared.
The saga began late last week when Union High coach Travis Turner was reported missing after last being seen on Thursday. That development became public later that day when police were dispatched to Turners home to investigate a complaint but could not find him.
A day later, assistant coach Jay Edwards guided the team to a 12-0 regional playoff victory over Graham High to improve to 12-0.
An extensive search operation has been in progress since, but the story took a darker turn on Tuesday with the report that Virginia police were seeking Turner, 46, in connection with allegations of child pornography possession and online solicitation of a minor. The charges pending include five counts of possession of child pornography and five counts of using a computer to solicit a minor, a Virginia State Police spokesperson confirmed.
Police did not say whether any victims or complaining witnesses are connected to the school.
Major penalties after wild Georgia brawl
A Georgia football playoff game erupted into an out-of-control brawl Friday that resulted in the winning team being gutted by mandatory suspensions handed down Monday and then upheld Tuesday in an emergency meeting.
The Georgia High School Association initially ruled 39 Gainesville High players out of this week's state Class 5A quarterfinal vs. Langston Hughes High as the result of the fight late in the third quarter vs. Brunswick High. Gainesville was also fined $5,000.
The brawl occurred with Gainesville leading 42-0. Video captured a Brunswick defender ripping the helmets off two Gainesville players and striking one of them. Players from both sidelines rushing toward midfield, and numerous punches were thrown. The referees called the game immediately.
Tuesday's hearing saw the GHSA reduce the number of suspensions from 39 to 35, which will still leave Gainesville severely hindered against top-ranked Langston Hughes. On the other side of the coin, Brunswick High officials accepted their school's penalties -- 41 suspensions, a $5,000 fine and a one-year postseason ban -- though the suspensions handed out to seniors are essentially meaningless.
"There is no place for incidents like this in education-based athletics," said Steve Waters, an assistant superintendent at Brunswick.
Meanwhile, Georgia media outlets reported that Gainesville officials are working with a law firm to file an injunction or restraining order to keep its penalties from being enforced for Friday's game.
"Our kids didn't go out there to instigate anything," head coach Josh Niblett said. "They went out there to have each other's back and protect each other."
Kentucky basketball coach is fighting back
Chris Gaither has been coaching boys basketball at Collins High in Louisville for 14 seasons but has been placed on paid leave, apparently over allegations by parents that led to him filing a defamation lawsuit.
"I love my team, and I love the group of kids," Gaither told The Courier Journal. "Going back to coach them would be the easy part. Dealing with the outside stuff would be the challenging part."
The "outside stuff" is his defamation case. Gaither, who owns a 294-149 record, says the defendants in his lawsuit sent emails to administrators at Collins and Christian Academy (where he had recently applied to coach) that caused "damage to his reputation and his good name in the community, at his place of employment and with prospective future employers."
Court documents include a letter from a defendant to Collins High administrators over Gaither's "mishandling of our children and the program." Another defendant forwarded correspondence to Christian Academy that listed a litany of serious allegations, all of which the coach denies.
Gaither's lawsuit claims the defendants knew the emails "were false and defamatory, and/or acted with reckless disregard for the truth or falsity of such matters." It is not known how much he is seeking in damages.
Missouri governing body under investigation
State attorney general Catherine Hanaway confirmed an impending investigation into the Missouri State High School Activities Association over an allegation that MSHSAA policy
bars certain individuals from serving on the board solely because of their race or sex.
Hanaway said Missouri Auditor Scott Fitzpatrick detailed the alleged MSHSAA policy uncovered after a whistleblower, who is both white and male, was informed he was not eligible for an at-large board position specifically because of his race and gender.
"Missouri does not tolerate race-based or sex-based discrimination, period," Hanaway said. "No organization that governs our public schools and our children's activities can operate under an immoral system that tells someone they are the wrong race or the wrong sex for leadership."
The MSHSAA constitution requires at-large seats to be filled by a candidate representing "the under-represented gender ... or an under-represented ethnicity."
Hanaway said the auditor's letter includes the email MSHSAA sent to the whistleblower and subsequent written exchanges in which MSHSAA defends the policy.
