An Abraham Lincoln softball player who claims her coach told her to "take it like a man" when she was injured during practice is suing the Department of Education for $5 million.

   Rebecca Sacerio, a 16-year-old third baseman, claims to have suffered permanent damage to a right index finger broken in three places during junior varsity fielding drills on May 2, 2009, The New York Post reported.

   "I told her it looked swollen and had a funny color," Sacerio told the paper. "(Coach Sari Schoenfeld) told me her hand always looked like that when she played."

   When she told Schoenfeld of the injury, the coach allegedly told her to "take it like a man."

   Sacerio said the finger swelled and she was in pain by the time she got home that night. Her mother, Paula, applied ice and gave her Tylenol, but two days passed with no improvement. Finally, a specialist told her she needed surgery, and three operations inserted and removed temporary vertical and horizontal rods. The lawsuit contends she suffered a post-surgery infection and now has arthritis in the finger, which is described as "useless."

   A Department of Education spokesman declined to comment, the paper reported.

   F-M lineup bolstered: Not that the team necessarily needed any help, but Fayetteville-Manlius is getting an extra set of legs this fall as the girls cross country team attempts to win its fifth straight Nike Cross Nationals crown in Portland, Ore.

   Coach Bill Aris learned last month that rising sophomore Katie Brislin, who lives about one mile from F-M, has decided to enroll at F-M. Before attending CBA for the past three years, Brislin was a student at Eagle Hill Middle School in Manlius.

   She placed seventh in the NYSPHSAA Class C championships last fall after placing 10th as an eighth-grader in 2008. The Hornets are returning four Class AA all-state runners in Courtney Chapman, Jillian Fanning, Katie Sischo and Heather Martin this season. They helped F-M win the 2009 NYSPHSAA Class AA title with an unprecedented perfect score.

   "Katie missed her friends, that's all. She's back running and training at Green Lakes State Park this summer with some former friends," Brislin's mother, Terry, told The Post-Standard.

   Edgemont makes change: Veteran Edgemont football

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coach Brian Connolly was not reappointed by the school board last month and is being replaced by Matt Bernstein, 27, the star fullback who led the Panthers to three straight state championships from 1998-2000, The Journal News reported.

   AD Ray Pappalardi said the school is in the process of filling out its coaching staff but Connolly will not have a role this year. Connolly will also take a leave of absence from the school, where he teaches physical education.

   Connolly has won five Section 1 Class C championships since the state playoff system was established in 1993. Bernstein rushed for a combined 3,887 yards in 1999 and 2000 and picked up back-to-back New York State Sportswriters Association player of the year awards as Edgemont became the second team to pull off a NYSPHSAA tournament three-peat.

   Extra points: Ithaca all-star senior midfielder Riley Lasda will head to Penn State rather than Cornell in 2011. According to The Post-Standard Lasda originally intended to follow his father, Brian, to Cornell but changed his mind when coach Jeff Tambroni left the Big Red to coach Penn State.

   A study in the July issue of Clinical Journal of Sports Medicine says fractures were the fourth most common injury (after ligament sprains, muscle sprains and bruising) in high school sports from 2005-09 but resulted in more lost time than all other injuries combined. The Center for Injury Research and Policy of The Research Institute at Nationwide Children's Hospital in Columbus, Ohio, also found that nearly 10 percent of fractures were related to illegal activities.