Minnesota Youth Sports Coach Shocks Players and Parents With Unsportsmanlike Demand

One of my children is old enough now that she is involved in more competitive sports and participating in tournaments, and we were at one this weekend and were shocked by one coaches unsportsmanlike comment to her team.

This was a soccer tournament being hosted in Shakopee, MN, there were many teams from around the state, including several from the Twin Ports area. Our team had two games on Saturday, and they were both great experiences for the teams, lots of competitiveness and sportsmanship, but things took a wild turn on Sunday.

I'm not going to say what team we were playing, but it was a team from the Twin Ports area and things were going good in the game until, and while the opposing coach was very vocal and seemed maybe a little aggressive, that didn't bother as much as what she yelled to the team after one of our players went down with an injury.

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During the timeout for the injury, the players on the field did what many players, both pro and amateur, do in that situation, they kneeled while the player was being attended to. This is very common, and I think is just good sportsmanship. Well, the opposing coach has a different opinion about this practice, the coach yelled, very loudly and aggressively:

"Get up, there is no need to kneel, GET UP and get in your spots!"

I heard several parents audibly gasp when the coach yelled this, many of us were left shocked by the comment, and even the players on the opposing team looked confused on whether they should stand up or not, even the kids knew that kneeling was the appropriate thing to do.

What was even more head-scratching, is when one of their players went down, our team and their team both took a knee, but I didn't hear the coach yell at them to get up in that situation.

What do you think? Is that inappropriate in a youth sports league to encourage that? I couldn't imagine the controversy if a professional coach in the NFL yelled at his players not to kneel during an injury.