Whitehaven girls basketball coach defends 110-2 win: 'It's hard to tell them to stand there'

Khari Thompson Tom Kreager
Memphis Commercial Appeal

Should a high school basketball team outscore an opponent by 108 points?

That is the buzz in Memphis after Whitehaven's girls basketball team defeated Kingsbury 110-2 on Tuesday night.

Whitehaven (12-3) is ranked No. 9 in the Associated Press statewide poll. Kingsbury's record is not known, but it has struggled this season. 

According to CoachT.com, the Falcons had at least three other games where they scored less than 10 points. The site also reported a 78-10 loss to Southwind on Nov. 1 and a 63-8 loss to Raleigh-Egypt on Dec. 6.

Whitehaven coach Lynn Smith said it's difficult to tell a basketball player not to score in a severely lopsided game.

Whitehaven girls basketball coach Lynn Smith defended his team scoring 110 points against Kingsbury.

"That’s easier said than done when you’ve got young kids," Smith said. "I didn’t want to totally chastise them and come down on them because they’re just young and they’re not going to respond well to that, especially when they have clear lanes to the basket.

"That’s just not basketball anymore. And I don't want to teach them not to play basketball."

Whitehaven and Kingsbury are set to play again on Feb. 4. 

"The only thing we can do is play a zone, sit back in a 2-3 and not play," Smith said. "You have to know that my varsity team only has one senior and one junior."

Smith said a running clock was used for the third and fourth quarters to speed up the game.

"We called off (the) game plan off at halftime. We had a running clock. We dropped back into a 2-3 zone. It’s just something that couldn’t be avoided," Smith said. "I don’t want to down the other team, but they just couldn’t score. And it just makes it hard on the coaches not to tell your kids just to stand there.

"It’s hard to tell them to stand there and not move at all. They would throw the ball away or throw it straight to us and of course my kids are going to lay the ball up."

Kingsbury coaches and administrators have not returned an interview request.

Smith said that his starters only played during the first quarter and the first three minutes of the third, and that freshmen played the rest of the game.

"That’s an extremely hard game for us. It’s not our intention to run the score up," Smith said. "I wanted our starters to get some kind of work in because this time of year you can’t just let them do nothing for four or five days until you play again on Friday. So I let them play a quarter and a half and then I let my ninth graders play the rest of the way."

TSSAA assistant executive director Gene Menees spoke Wednesday with the lead high school referee who worked the game.

The lead official confirmed to Menees that Smith pulled his starters during the first quarter and continued to press during the first quarter. After the first quarter, the official told Menees that Whitehaven players would wait until Kingsbury advanced the ball past midcourt, steal it and shoot layups.

Menees said the official confirmed there was a running clock in the third and fourth quarters.