Illinois Basketball Coach Teaches Team Lesson In Sportsmanship
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APRIL 16, 2009
David Johnson, Citizen Journalist

Most coaches are upset when a basketball player misses a free-throw. But this situation was different, and coach Dave Rohlman made sure his player knew that this time he was expected to miss the shots. "You realize you're going to miss them, don't you?" Rohlman said. Darius McNeal nodded his head. He understood, and missed the free-throws by a mile!
What was going on? It was a lesson in sportsmanship.
Hours earlier, the mother of Milwaukee Madison senior captain Johntel Franklin died at a local hospital. Carlitha Franklin, only 39 years old, had just lost a five-year fight with cervical cancer. "She was young and they were real close," said Milwaukee coach Aaron Womack Jr., who was at the hospital. "He was very distraught and it happened so suddenly he didn't have time to grieve."
Womack intended to cancel the game, but Franklin told him he wanted the team to play. And play they did, even though the game started late and Milwaukee Madison dressed only eight players. Early in the second quarter, Womack saw someone out of the corner of his eye. It was Franklin, who came there directly from the hospital to root his teammates on.
The Knights had possession, so Womack called a time out. His players went over and hugged their grieving teammate. Fans came out of the stands to do the same. "We got back to playing the game and I asked if he wanted to come and sit on the bench," Womack said. "No," Franklin replied. "I want to play."
However, there was a problem. Since Franklin wasn't on the pre-game roster, putting him in meant drawing a technical foul that would give DeKalb two free throws. Even though it was a tight game, Womack was willing to give up the two points. He felt it was important to help his senior guard and co-captain deal with his grief by playing.
Over on the other bench, though, Coach Rohlman didn't want to take the penalty shots. He told the referees to forget the technical and just let Franklin play. "I could hear them arguing for five to seven minutes, saying, `We're not taking it, we're not taking it," Womack said. "The refs told them, no, that's the rule. You have to take them."
That's when Rohlman asked for volunteers, and McNeal's hand went up.
He went alone to the free throw line, dribbled the ball a couple of times, and looked at the rim. His first attempt went about two feet, bouncing a couple of times as it rolled toward the end line. The second barely left his hand.
It didn't take long for the Milwaukee players to figure out what was going on. They stood and turned toward the DeKalb bench and started applauding the gesture of sportsmanship. Soon, so did everybody in the stands.
"I did it for the guy who lost his mom," McNeal told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. "It was the right thing to do."
Milwaukee Madison won the game 62-47. Afterward, the teams went out for pizza, two players from each team sharing each pie. Franklin stopped by briefly, thankful that his team was there for him. "I got kind of emotional but it helped a lot just to play," he said. "I felt like I had a lot of support out there."
It hasn't been the greatest season for the DeKalb team, but it has still been a good year. "We maybe don't have the best basketball players in the world but they go to class and take care of business," Womack said. "We have a losing record but there's life lessons going on, good ones."
Maybe the best lesson was learned the moment a team and a player decided there were more important things than winning and having good stats. Sure they went home with a loss, but it was a game they'll never forget. "This is something our kids will hold for a lifetime," Rohlman said. "They may not remember our record 20 years from now, but they'll remember what happened in that gym that night."
For more on this story, check out this link: http://highschool.rivals.com/content.asp?CID=914609