Another sad recruiting note... there's been some talk in the chatrooms lately about an article from the Washington Post discussing issues of homosexuality and recruiting. The article is no longer available free on the web, but through the magic of my Lexis account at work, I read it today. The article tells how some schools engage in negative recruiting by telling recruits not to go to a certain school because the coach is gay. Some coaches made indirect remarks to recruit Chelsea Trotter to try to convince her to avoid Stanford and Coach VanDerveer. Coach VanDerveer says she has been facing such tactics for years. Trotter chose Stanford anyway.

Penn State coach Rene Portland said in 1991 that she doesn't tolerate "drinking, drugs or lesbians." (In a similar, but apparently unrelated story, the Russian military just announced that it's banning gays and drug addicts.) The school has essentially overruled her, but Coach Portland sounds like she still follows the same policy. Last fall, an assistant coach at Georgia told a class that they won't take lesbians on the team; she subsequently recanted.

The article was by Greg Sandoval, titled "Going Behind the Back," appeared in the 1-24-03 edition of the Post.