BOTC - US Lacrosse Community Forum Forums NORTHEAST LACROSSE BOTC MAIN FORUM (LI, CT, WC) Huntington Girls Varsity Lacrosse

Hello Parents,


My name is Molly Burnett. Most of you know me as the now ex assistant varsity coach at Huntington High School. I have been debating posting my input on this website for some time now and now that I have officially stepped down I am finding that it is the right time to do so. I know that most of you will probably skip right over this post, written by someone as “incompetent”, “terrible” and “dumb” as myself (your words, not mine) but if you do happen to continue reading this I urge you to do so with open minds.

As an alumni of the Huntington High School lacrosse program I was so proud and excited to be involved in coaching your girls, and to do it next to one of the best coaches I knew, Kathy Wright, just seemed to be the icing on the cake. Let me make something very clear, I truly do not care what you say about me on BOTC, I understand that many of you as parents just want what’s best for your daughters. If you think that I’m an “imbecile” or “horrible” that is your own personal opinion and you are entitled to that. What you say on this website has no effect on me whatsoever. However, the fact that you come on this website and anonymously slander someone as wholehearted as Kathy makes me sick to my stomach.

If you want to talk about a coach that goes above and beyond what is required of a High School lacrosse coach then look no further. Kathy devotes her entire self to a thankless job. I have been involved in the lacrosse community for close to two decades and never have I ever met a more kind, caring, selfless and talented lacrosse coach than Kathy. She truly cares about your daughters, not only as lacrosse players, but as people. She is one of the only coaches that I know to say “School and Health come first” and actually mean it and if you were all too jaded to see the gem that was in front of you then I truly feel sorry for you.

I will not go into what happened during this season, as if I were to name any of your daughters and their actions and their college coaches were to come across this that would be the end of their collegiate lacrosse careers. You all know what your daughter’s partook in, and to be honest, I’m not sure if I can entirely blame them. Children are a direct reflection of their upbringing and having parents that chose to come onto an anonymous website to bash the coaching staff instead of calling the office to arrange a sit down in regards to their concerns is obviously going to translate to the way your daughters chose to conduct themselves. The fact that some of you even promoted their actions and were directly involved with helping your daughter's slander the coaching staff leaves me to believe that no matter what coach was in our position, it wouldn't matter.

All of your girls are extremely talented, and the ones that are going on to play lacrosse in college all deserve to be playing for the teams they are. But parents, I am telling you, you are doing them a huge disservice by fighting their battles for them and promoting the kind of hatred that you spewed towards us this season. I ask of you to place your daughter in our shoes, how would you feel if grown adults were saying the things that you all said about us to your daughter. Imagine your daughter, fresh out of college and wanting to continue her lacrosse career by coaching. Imagine her in 30 years, married and with children, working full time and putting in countless unpaid hours for an underpaid high school lacrosse job. Now imagine her coming onto this website to see everything that the parents of the girls she is working so hard to help, to coach, to mentor, spewing the utter hatred that you have all done this past season.

As your girls head off to college I hope you, as parents, have the decency to sit back and let your daughter’s flourish into the amazing women that I know they can become. College lacrosse is a completely different animal and if you expect the coaches to baby your girls and tell them “everything will be okay” you are in for a rude awakening. In college, if you can't produce there are five other girls riding the bench that can. You need tough skin and an even tougher work ethic and without both of these there is absolutely no way to excel at the collegiate level. If you believe that calling the AD or the President of the college will make a difference then you’re right. It will make a difference in that your girl’s college coach will bench her based on principle alone. All of your girls have the potential to do amazing things, I just hope that during their collegiate careers they learn humility, mental toughness and courage that so obviously lacking on this website.

I am sure that after I post this there will be a number of anonymous comments calling me all sorts of things, and to those users that do not possess the courage to tell me what they think of me to my face, all I can say is that I’m sorry. I’m sorry that you have reached a point in your life where you feel that you need to feel good about yourself by anonymously posting about people who dedicate a significant amount of time, effort and money to making your daughters better lacrosse players, athletes and most of all better people. When push comes to shove and lacrosse is all over all that really matters is how you come out of it as a person, this is a lesson every athlete will learn at some point and when your daughters finally do I hope they can hold their heads up high and say with no uncertain terms that they are proud of the women they have become.

The next time you decide to slander a coach I urge you to read a great article, titled "I Am Your Coach. Not Your Mother." and if you still have concerns I beg of you to request a sit down with the coach and AD to discuss any concerns you may have.

Any coach worth their salt will take any problems or concerns you may have seriously, excluding the often used“I think my daughter is better so she should be playing,” excuse that so many parents believe to be a valid reason that their daughters should be playing. I assure you, every coach has a valid reason for who is on the field and why and I can promise you that none of it has to do with their outside teams.
To the parents and the players that supported Kathy and I during this past season, whether it be in the stands, on this blog or in general, I thank you from the bottom of my heart. You were truly a bright light during this past season and I cannot thank you enough. If there is anyone else who wishes to make derogatory comments about last years Huntington High School coaching staff, please feel free to call me on my cell. All your daughters have my number.


Best Regards,
Molly Burnett

Kudos to you, Molly.

I think you hit quite a few nails on the head but sadly, the trolls will not even get it.

I applaud your effort!!

Excellent post, I'm sure some high school team will be lucky enough to scoop you up

I cant imagine the amount of thought and second guessing that went into putting this letter here. I am not from Huntington nor do i understand what is happening there, but I must commend you on your courage to speak your mind. Good luck in whatever you decide to do, and I hope one bad experience does not lead you away from doing something you love.

The silence is deafening

I still don't know what the problem of the last season was. Why did we have a tremendous amount of d1 commits but we could barely win a game. Every win was a huge effort. We played only certain players over and over and left a fairly deep bench seated. This letter doesn't explain anything for me, clears up nothing, only added to my confusion over the bust of the season. just don't get it at all.

Ahhh, the "my daughter sat the bench" parent.

The coaches do not always get it right. I have seen it in our district in many sports. Sometimes it's political, sometimes they just get it wrong, sometimes its personal, sometimes the coaches are incompetent, sometimes the better player has an attitude problem.

In our district we have seen players leave and go to a private and have great success then go on to play D1 and also have tremendous success. We have seen kids stay and ride the bench and then go on to college and out perform just about all of the kids that played in front of them.

Some parents do not have a realistic view of their kids ability but there are also many coaches who do not play the best kids. The coaches do not always get it right.

Agreed BUT I find it mostly to be the latter.

I started coaching youth sports 15 years ago. I loved all sports growing up on Long Island. I have five kids and have coached football,soccer,baseball,basketball and Lacrosse.

When I was growing up playing sports in the 70's parents were not involved. We played for our school teams and respected our coaches !

Now, almost every parent has the thought that maybe their kid can get into a great college. So they buy into the club teams that have found that they can make a ton of tax free money by selling them a dream.

The parents and the money hungry club teams have changed high school sports.
They hear the stories of kids getting commitments in 8th or 9th grade and are willing to try anything to help their kids. The club teams know this and play the parents, milking them of thousands of dollars that should be put towards school related activities.

The parents get angry when the high school coaches don't play their kids after giving the club teams a ton of money so they stay on the sideline complaining and starting trouble for the high school coaches.

The club teams also try to influence college coaches to look at their players. The parents that are the best customers get the first looks. It has become a big money game !

I feel sorry for the high school coaches who are not in it for the money but because they just love the game !

Huntington's coach was also an outside lax club paid employee. Big part of the problem.

High schools must see the conflict of interest!!!

A high school coach should not be a paid employee of a club team!
It gives parents and players a reason to think they are not being treated fairly.

Am I the only person that thinks this is a conflict of interest ?

I don't. I prefer a coach for my youth player that has the depth of knowledge a varsity coach has. What else would be the point of having a paid coach?

A high school coach can not make money coaching an outside league??? Besides the fact we live in a free society, how do you impose that? How much money do you think coaches make??? Not that much, if you do it for a paycheck there are much more profitable things to do. It's a year round thankless job, that you are only paid for the spring to do.

Thanks TR

Good luck Coach Burnett and to Coach Wright as well

Sadly the kids lose out again! Excessive Parental involvement forced these coaches out. The Long Island coaching community is small and word has spread quickly what has transpired here.....NOBODY WILL TOUCH THIS JOB. Thx Moms and Dads

Another big part of the problem was the travel lax director from Team Elevate stirring up trouble in the stands.

Very sad reading all this as an outsider. There are many HS coaches that work for the top travel teams island wide just look at their bios but you don't hear this kind of talk.
Don't you think at the end of the day they want to coach a winning team and maybe put a championship notch in their belt? To me, a winning coach makes them more desirable and in demand .They are certainly not coaching HS for the big payday.
This whole story makes no sense to me and I'm sure there's a few more tails to it just hope coaches and players move on and wish them good luck.

Dave is very good at stirring up trouble which is just what he did when he destroyed a very succesful 2012 team that his daughter played on a few years back. Maybe he will save the day and get someone from his club to fill the vacancy at Huntington.

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!

what I think it means is that these "coaches" focused more on their personal preferences based on outside teams and previous relationships rather than actually playing the BETTER goalie and feeding the kids empty promises. These coaches did not do their jobs to better these girls' games and let conflict of interest get in the way of team that could have transcended what they sadly were during the season. Mommy and Daddy did a fantastic job at getting their daughter the RIGHT coach and let their kid's skill stick it to the HS coach in the best way possible. I'm genuinely glad they're gone.

Thanks delusional goalie dad!

I understand that you obviously thought your daughter was the better player, and she is obviously very good. However, did you ever stop to think that the goalie who played over her was also very good?? No, of course not, because you felt the need to destroy these women because you have a case of 'my daughter is better' Sad.

This site provides an outlet for people to voice their concerns.

There are many parents who feel that confronting a coach directly will only result in negative consequences for their child.

We all know that there are crazy parents out there who are not capable of honestly evaluating their children.

Hopefully we also know that there are more than a few coaches out there who do more harm than good.

I am not familiar with the Huntington situation but I cant listen to the whiny coaches any longer.

I have read many time on this site how the coaches are underpaid and how it is a thankless job. Every time someone writes a negative comment about a coach it is assumed that it was written by a parent of a player who is sitting on the bench. "Coaches want to win" "Coaches play the best players" "Coaches will be fired if they do not win" , all BS in my humble opinion. There are some really bad coaches out there and they should be removed.

There are coaches who will punish the player if they have a problem with the parent. There are coaches who allow their personal feelings to influence decisions. Some coaches are spiteful and vindictive. Some coaches are incompetent. Some lack character. Some are allowing money to create a conflict of interest. Some have thin skin and rabbit ears. Some post on this site. Some care very much what is written here. Some try and figure out what parents are posting on here. Some refuse to look in the mirror and give an honest assessment of themselves and the Job they have done.

If a conflict of interest was present and it had a negative impact on the Huntington Girls Program then shame on the coaches.

If there were crazy parents who drove the coaches out without cause then shame on them.

If the coach could not find a way to play a player who is "very good" then shame on the coach. (learn to manage the situation)

Here is a message to all the coaches out there.

Do the right thing. Do not coach for a Club Team, do not create your own Town Club Team. Do not become too friendly with ANY of the parents. Do not gossip about players or parents. Do not whine about the parents. Do not permit any parent to influence you especially regarding any of the players. Do not have pre conceived notions about players or parents.

Just go and coach. Leave your agenda and ego at the door, it is not about you it is about the kids. If you can not handle the crazy parents then do not coach.

The "Program" belongs to the kids, not the coaches. If your skin is thin and you have become bitter then find something else to do with your time.

No one in their right mind would coach at H-ton now.

hmmm..i bet Dave K. would....has anyone asked him?

I think a very basic rule would be no HS coaches that have a child in the same school district. This can be seen as the root of many problems. It's just too easy to point to favoritism, why would a school set themselves up for that? Every year you saw 1-2 more Huntington girls being added to this YJ team. It is just too intertwined. Parent coaches should end after PAL.

The truth is, people have been complaining about the coaching staff for several years now. The argument between people who think parents/players are being ridiculous and the coaches were out of line is never going to be solved - it is personal opinion. Here are some facts I do know:
- Some people loved Kathy, some really did not. Of the people who do not like her, they ranged from field hockey players, to lacrosse starters, to lacrosse nonstarters.
- That being said, I don't think this was a matter of a club team director doing this. There were complaints made before everything went down from this year. There were also complaints made this year from plenty of people who were not involved in the director's club.

- I definitely understand the argument about goalies when people state that the starting goalie was very good - I agree! With that being said, how could you 1. barely play a goalie headed to UNC and who is nationally ranked and 2. BARELY play a senior goalie who was also headed to play college lacrosse and definitely deserved some time on the field. I am not talking about tight games, I am talking about games that I watched where Hton was winning by 10+ goals and these two goalies did not see more than 10 minutes on the field.

- I commend the assistant for what she wrote in this thread to an extent. I thought it was brave to post her name and to address everyone honestly. What I found wrong was that she would belittle parents and players so much so when she knows that many (not all!) were good people who had honest points. Once again, NOT ALL - some were ridiculous. I also found it wrong when she brought up the negativity it could bring the players if she wrote their names, specifically mentioning their college careers. That, in my opinion, was a subtle threat. Once again, MY OPINION.

- All in all, it is a shame that this Huntington team was not successful last year. With the talent they had, I believe they could have gone very far.

I think we need to stop playing the blame game - crazy parents, ungrateful kids, awful coach - and just realize that the situation at Huntington was volatile enough that a change had to be made. For the girls sake, we should move past pointing fingers and hope that they can spend the rest of their high school lacrosse careers having fun.

The Huntington coaching staff just didn't have a plan . They mismanaged the starters horribly, and had the non- starters sit there at practice doing absolutely nothing every day. As a coach , you should have SOMETHING planned for all the players at practice. It's amazing to me that the bench players didn't quit . They were COMPLETELY ignored. There was no "mentoring" going on there for any of the players. It was laughable. Huntington needed a change.

Too lazy to go back and read all of the posts.

Please tell me , did the coaches quit or were they fired?

Thank you

The coaches resigned.

Since when has a coaching become an underpaid thankless job? Coaching a team putting together a group of kids and watching them grow into a cohesive group and improving their skills is exhilarating. Many kids lives have been transformed by good and caring coaches. For some kids the best part of their day is when there on the court or the field with their friends and teammates. Winning is great and the ultimate goal but I've seen beautiful scenes of losing teams crying and hugging each other and embracing their coaches. Coaching can be a very fulfilling and rewarding experience but it can be tough at times and thats when managerial skills come into play but you can never blame the team under any circumstances for you are the coach, the captain of the ship, the ultimate responsibility lies with you. And if you have a problem with that, then it is an underpaid thankless job.

weird thought , may be the team just wasn't as good as all the parents thought ?

Hey maybe you are on to something. Let's take UNC for instance year after year they have a roster full of all American thoroughbreds. After all is said and done they have (1) National Championship. We are talking full time staffs and the very best of support systems. So maybe it takes more than talent and coaching to win. No Me ! Just We !

So who IS going to be the new varsity coach for Huntington?

Probably some HS teacher that is getting ready to retire and looking to pad his/her pension. They will know nothing about lacrosse and will be looking for the season to end as quickly as possible because they don't get paid any extra for post season. Be careful what you wish for!

True justice. Huntington probably won't see a real coach until the current group of parents rotate out. Even if the parents are completely right, what coach wants to be involved in this kind of drama and deal with activist parents?

Or maybe they were playing other schools that are also stacked with talent and were better
Just because the parents thought they would be good.... No one from outside was thinking that.

That seems like an accurate assessment of what happened last year.