B3

Bruce Hallihan
SPORTS WRITER

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You may have heard school district superintendents directed the New Brunswick Interscholastic Athletic Association to make some changes for next season, including banning competitions scheduled during class hours and tightening up travel times for away games.

The new policies aren't popular.

Critics say superintendents are targetting student-athletes for the school time they miss. The implication seems to be "You can't be learning or studying if you're too busy travelling and playing."

I don't believe that.

I've seen good athletes with good grades and good athletes with bad grades, but don't typical students have good and bad marks too?

My mother was a teacher for more than 30 years and I'm sure she's seen it all. Yet, I never heard her say "So-and-so is failing because he's too busy with sports."

If a student-athlete is having academic problems, parents, teachers and coaches take steps to correct the problem rather than ignore it. Isn't that just common sense?

I liked playing most sports in school, but I wasn't a jock-of-all-trades.

In Grade 12, I remember playing ball hockey four nights a week from September to April: Sundays and Wednesdays in Chatham; Tuesdays and Thursdays in nearby Newcastle.

Ball hockey games were only an hour but, as a goalie with full gear, I was first to arrive and last to leave.

Ball hockey season rolled into provincial junior baseball league practices and games.

With an 87 average, I wasn't in the scholarship stratosphere but I didn't have submarine marks (below C level) either. I was busy but my grades didn't plummet.

A more recent - and better - example occurred just last month when my niece, Ashley Carson, graduated from Petitcodiac Regional High School with a mid-90s average, some $16,000 in scholarships and female athlete of the year honours.

Heck, she even received a standing ovation for singing Lee Ann Womack's I Hope You Dance to her peers and an appreciative audience.

***

Another example comes from a letter from one of the captains of the John Caldwell Golden Knights varsity girls basketball team.

This past year, her graduating year, she was involved in numerous committees, played for the basketball team, was manager for the girls volleyball team and was a member of the senior concert band.

Her overall average was 95 per cent and, last year, she received a plaque for "academics and athletics", awarding students who excel both in sports and their school work.

"I can't even begin to count the number of times my teammates and I have spent studying in hotel rooms, in vehicles or in a gym between games," she wrote, "by doing this, we have learned to cope with distractions and accomplish studying in difficult situations.

"If we are continuously given the easy path throughout high school, what will we do in university when we are hit hard by the reality of the real world?" she continued.

"We have to learn how to continue our studies, even when situations present themselves. Since I have experienced having a huge test on a Monday morning after a three-day tournament, or a test the morning after getting home at 11 o'clock at night from a game, I know I will be prepared for whatever is thrown my way at university. I know I have developed the skills to succeed."

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Something that's been downplayed, but is sure to cause a stir at some point is pushing the last day of tournaments from Saturday to Sunday.

"That seems to be the only way around the fact tournaments can no longer start before the school day ends on Friday.

A third of Canadian teenagers regularly attend church services on Sundays, so what is, say, a Doaktown Panther or Hartland Husky to do? I'm thinking a Devon Park Christian School Eagle will put the cross before crossover semifinals. In the past, there was no flap because there was no overlap.

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I don't quite know what to make of the AAA, AA and A divisions being reduced to AAA and AA. Blowouts are sure to occur, but blowouts have always occurred.

For parity purposes, I'd rather see four divisions than two: AAA Tier 1, AAA Tier 2, AA Tier 1 and AA Tier 2.

Come playoff time, there would be Tier 1 and Tier 2 titles up for grabs. The traditionally best AAA teams could still win titles but the traditionally best AA teams (Woodstock, Tantramar, Carleton North, etc.) could still have a banner year, too - only as AAA Tier 2 champs.

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TBS baseball commentator Ron Darling, as quoted in the L.A. Times, on Cincinnati Reds slugger Adam Dunn: "He's so strong he blows bubbles with beef jerky."

Bruce Hallihan can be reached at 458-6442 or hallihan.bruce@dailygleaner.com. His column appears Thursdays. However, he's on holidays next week, returning to this space July 17.