ShareThisBy DAN WOLKEN
Scripps Howard News Service
Tuesday, May 15, 2007
When University of Houston basketball player Becky Gibson told coach Joe Curl she was pregnant last season, his policy was clear.
"The way we handle it, with the blessing of our athletic director, president and senior women's administrator, we kept her as part of the family and will continue until she gets her degree," Curl said. "I've seen the other side of it, where as soon as they couldn't throw it in the basket or defend it, they were gone. I believe that's wrong."
ESPN's "Outside the Lines" on May 6 reported that some female student-athletes had their scholarships taken away or suspended as a result of becoming pregnant.
Three women's basketball coaches at the Conference USA spring meetings, which commenced here Monday, said that pregnancy had impacted their teams.
All three said they would not pull a scholarship from a player who became pregnant and was unable to perform.
"I've seen this -- we dealt with this years ago, not as much recently -- but a female's first thought is, I'll lose my education, I've got to do something about it, and it brings on thoughts of abortions," Southern Methodist University coach Rhonda Rompola said. "And it becomes a very sensitive issue at that point."
When one of her players became pregnant three years ago, University of Texas-El Paso coach Keitha Adams said she worked with the player's family and support system to come up with a solution. That player, Ana Valtierra, sat out a year on a medical red shirt and then returned to the team to finish her basketball career.
"I'm an educator, and I think most of us are in this to help kids," Adams said. "With the majority of situations, your administration, your coaches, your families, people are going to sit down and evaluate things to see, OK, how can we make this work? In some cases, it might not be able to work, but we made it work."
In Memphis' case, Cassandra Harding said she had signed a form with her coach that outlined the circumstances -- including pregnancy -- that would cause a loss or suspension of her scholarship.
Athletic director R.C. Johnson said he saw the ESPN show but acknowledged the issue would be discussed further.
"We're going to look at it, certainly," Johnson said.
Houston's Curl said his decision to keep a pregnant player on scholarship was "a reflection of the common sense of doing the right thing," especially with the financial and emotional struggles that often accompany the situation.
"The player punished herself so much where she made constant comments about letting her team down, letting her coaching staff down," Curl said. "We said, 'No, no, no. You're teaching us a vital lesson we couldn't have learned in a win or loss or tie or a conference championship. What you taught us was that life is more important than any stupid game.' And that's how we pulled her back out of the depression of not being able to play her senior year. I'm really proud of how we handled it."
SMU's Rompola said coaches are often placed in a delicate situation on subjects like safe sex practices that parents of players may not want coaches to talk about.
"What frustrates me is sometimes I don't feel like we can coach our kids because we have to watch what we say, but in reality we're the immediate figure that is there for them," Rompola said. "And if we can't coach our kids or talk to them like they are our own daughters, it makes it very difficult to educate them on topics like this. You really have to tell them to be smart, but what if they ask, 'What does that mean?' "
(Contact Dan Wolken of The Commercial Appeal in Memphis, Tenn., at www.commercialappeal.com.)
