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Lonergan fired at GW


billikenfan05

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Fired for verbal abuse of players, disparaging remarks made about the GW athletic director, and his reference to Seton Hall Guard Derrick Gordon as "the gay kid." Wonder if the Associate Head Coach Hajj Turner will move up as an interim. Might be tough for Turner to continue there as he's coached under Lonergan for the last 11 years.

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A source told ESPN that Lonergan left campus at midday Friday and didn't tell anyone why. George Washington also had a recruit on campus for an official visit Friday and Lonergan unexpectedly didn't show up for dinner with him, a source said.

Well that recruit's visit went well, didn't it.

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Sounds to me like a real blow up took place in GW sometime Friday and Lonergan was just offed, period. Whatever the official causes given for the termination may be. that will be all they are: the official causes for the termination. I would think that this event will alter the pecking order within A10 for this coming season, and no I do not think the alteration of the pecking order in A10 will go low enough to affect us in any way.

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Lonergan was fired as a result of an independent investigation into the allegations made of his verbal abuse of players and homophobic slurs on the GW Athletic Director and "gay kid" from Seton Hall among other things.  The school fired him over usual claims that it is their responsibility to provide all students with a safe, nuturing environment for all learning among all students including its athletic teams.  The investigation showed Lonergan was not in line with such a policy.   This is all part of this summer's Washington Post claims and the fact that 13 basketball players have transferred out during Lonergan's tenure.  Lonergan and the team just returned from an overseas trip to Japan this week. There was no discussion of the naming of an interim coach and the status of the remaining staff was only discussed by a hanging question on "their job security."  Lonergan was 97 and 70 in his time there,winning last year's NIT.

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32 minutes ago, slu72 said:

Next thing you know locker rooms will have safe zones. Eastwood's right, we've become a nation of pu*&%es.

Might be, but there is no need to verbally abuse your players. During one of his tirades, he made a denigrating reference to one of his players as possibly being a transsexual. There is no need for this in coaching just as there was no need to for Bobby Knight to put tampons in players' lockers to send them the message that he thought they were playing like pu$$ies.

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2 hours ago, slu72 said:

Next thing you know locker rooms will have safe zones. Eastwood's right, we've become a nation of pu*&%es.

Lets see how you feel about it if it happened to your kid or grandchild.  What recourse does a player have - leave and sit a year, punch him out and go to jail, or report it.  Clearly the latter is the best alternative and obviously the coach was found guilty.  There is a big difference between being called a soft player or a push over but when you start making it just mean spirited then it is over the line.  

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You guys do realize that many coaches who were verbally hard on their players got more out of them than the player thought they could deliver. Plus, many "old players" still admire these guys, because they taught them life ain't easy. I'm not  supportive of Lonegran's style. Mostly, because times have changed, and he should have known it. But I don't want my grandsons getting trophies for just showing up, or their mom brought the bean dip for after game snacks.

Not saying sports should be like Paris Island. It's just that at this stage, ie D1 sports, winning is the only thing that counts. And these coaches are trying to get their players to a winning level. You shouldn't denigrate a player's personal life choice or style to do that, but getting in someone's face about why you think he or she can do more than they are showing is not really a bad thing.

If Lonegran slurred a gay or a transgender over his life choice, that's wrong. But if that player took his criticism the wrong way, ie "he's all over me because I'm gay", that may be a cop out on the player's part. I guess that's where a coach these days walks a very fine line. Still, there should be no safety zones or special treatment when it comes to sports at any level.  

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Sorry slu72 trying to justify bad behavior just is hard to do.  By the way, at one time black players were not recruited to D1 schools - so just because it happened doesn't make it right.  Things change for the better and coaches have to change also.  I am sure you did not appreciate a boss that denigrated his/her employees.  All we need is people to respect other people.

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I am not trying to justify bad behavior but I would like to point out that Lonergan most likely behaved in the exactly the same way from the very beginning of his tenure as head coach at GW. It is said the leopard does not change his spots, well let's apply that saying to this event as well. Since Lonergan was head coach at GW for a number of years, it should be evident that his behavior was tolerated by the GW administration for many years before they took action to investigate. This multi year delay points out that some specific event probably happened that kicked the administration into action about what had become the standard pattern of behavior by Lonergan for a number of years. In addition to Lonergan's bad behavior, which appears to be a fact, we should also consider the tolerance for such behavior shown by GW's administration for many years to the mix. This, of course, brings up the question: why was this behavior tolerated by the administration for so long, and what happened to kick the administration into taking action after such a long delay?

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The Washington Post.  Just like Al-Jazeerah jump started the NFL to "go after" Manning, Harrison, Matthews, etc.  Anything the Post takes on in that town gets proper attention, even trivial things like botched plumbing jobs in high-rise apartment buildings. 

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22 hours ago, slu72 said:

Next thing you know locker rooms will have safe zones. Eastwood's right, we've become a nation of pu*&%es.

If you are looking for some poor victim of the "PC police" narrative, I think you should look elsewhere. This is a story of a guy continually defying and openly ripping his boss. That's usually not going to end well for any employee. If anything, GW gave this creep too long of a leash for too long.

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23 hours ago, slu72 said:

Next thing you know locker rooms will have safe zones. Eastwood's right, we've become a nation of pu*&%es.

Okay, so maybe harassing and abusing college kids shouldn't be a huge deal. Something something Bobby Knight, Rick Majerus. But In what line of work could you keep your job after running around spreading vulgar rumors about the sexual orientation of your boss (the guy who hired you in the first place)?

The timing here really sucks for GW. I'm not sure why the "investigation" or even negotiating the buy out should have taken two months to finish. Lonergan's teams consistently underachieved the last several years anyway, so this seems like a decision that could have been made a lot more quickly. Now they're without a coach six weeks before the season starts in what was already set to be a down year.

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15 hours ago, slu72 said:

You guys do realize that many coaches who were verbally hard on their players got more out of them than the player thought they could deliver. Plus, many "old players" still admire these guys, because they taught them life ain't easy. I'm not  supportive of Lonegran's style. Mostly, because times have changed, and he should have known it. But I don't want my grandsons getting trophies for just showing up, or their mom brought the bean dip for after game snacks.

Not saying sports should be like Paris Island. It's just that at this stage, ie D1 sports, winning is the only thing that counts. And these coaches are trying to get their players to a winning level. You shouldn't denigrate a player's personal life choice or style to do that, but getting in someone's face about why you think he or she can do more than they are showing is not really a bad thing.

If Lonegran slurred a gay or a transgender over his life choice, that's wrong. But if that player took his criticism the wrong way, ie "he's all over me because I'm gay", that may be a cop out on the player's part. I guess that's where a coach these days walks a very fine line. Still, there should be no safety zones or special treatment when it comes to sports at any level.  

I don't think the players are the problem here. From the previous article about the situation, which we discussed a few months ago here:

"Five current and former players said Lonergan told players [athletic director] Nero requested the practice tapes so he could masturbate while viewing them in his office. The players said Lonergan also told them Nero had engaged in a sexual relationship with a member of the team. Players said they found those comments to be shocking and offensive, with no grounding in reality...

"According to multiple players, Lonergan’s critiques crossed the line from constructive to mean-spirited. He told one player his son would always be on food stamps. He told another, in front of the team, he should transfer to a “transgender league,” multiple players said.

One person close to a former GW player said he “went through hell” playing for Lonergan because of constant personal comments and critiques. One former player said he attended therapy and considered quitting basketball because of Lonergan’s language and actions toward him."

You can't talk about your boss that way, and he's crossing a line with the players from typical-tough-guy-coach BS to flat-out personal attacks. Players can take a lot from coaches, so when there's this level of attrition and guys willing to speak up, there's a problem. Plus, D-I coaches get paid too much to act like that. It's embarrassing.

I guess there will always be the chest-thumping sports people who think we've gone soft as a society, but athletes are way more evolved physically and mentally than the mindless drones certain people still think they are. This form of coaching is gradually going extinct, and rightfully so. The only surprise here is that GW took so long to fire him.

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4 hours ago, Old guy said:

I am not trying to justify bad behavior but I would like to point out that Lonergan most likely behaved in the exactly the same way from the very beginning of his tenure as head coach at GW. It is said the leopard does not change his spots, well let's apply that saying to this event as well. Since Lonergan was head coach at GW for a number of years, it should be evident that his behavior was tolerated by the GW administration for many years before they took action to investigate. This multi year delay points out that some specific event probably happened that kicked the administration into action about what had become the standard pattern of behavior by Lonergan for a number of years. In addition to Lonergan's bad behavior, which appears to be a fact, we should also consider the tolerance for such behavior shown by GW's administration for many years to the mix. This, of course, brings up the question: why was this behavior tolerated by the administration for so long, and what happened to kick the administration into taking action after such a long delay?

Well, Nero is the one who hired Lonergan, so they must have had a decent working relationship at least to start. I can't imagine he was running around telling players that their AD likes to jack off to their practice videos for the whole time he was there. I imagine that could have been the final straw, even considering his consistent pattern of hotheaded coach behavior before that.

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UPDATE:  Lonergan is now suing GeeDubya for "wrongful termination and treatment."  According to a statement from his lawyers composed yesterday and released to USA Today earlier this morning, Lonergan "was denied administrative due process when the school terminated his contract."  The statement also says "George Washington never identified the accuser nor the details and the substance of the anonymous accusations and that Lonergan will seek 'appropriate relief from the university for this wrongful termination and treatment.'"

Still no resolution to the new/interim coaching situation either.  Sounds like Lonergan is arguing about due process in this case.  Don't knowhow wthat works in terms of a private institution hiring and firing one of its employees.  However, from Lonergan's point of view, sounds indeed like a railroading.  In the "he said/she said" world of attorneys and all, Lonergan appears to have never been given a chance to defend himself here.  Not saying he is innocent or guilty just saying a lot of the investigation went on with him out of the country.  If they interviewed all 13 transfers, I'd think they'd all have an axe to grind and grind it against Lonergan. 

Frankly, watching him and his sideline antics would seem to suggest to me he is capable of such erratic outbursts. 

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2 hours ago, Taj79 said:

Oh, I don't kno w...... Schmidt, Hurley, Gianinni and Martelli all deserve consideration. 

 

That's DOCTOR Gianinni sir!

They're all great to heckle, Will Wade actually seems like a respectable person. I loathe Hurley. Gianinni and Martelli have always been so easy to yell at, they have that old school "tired" look that coaches of that age tend to have. Dunphy was another I loved to yell at.

No one, no one, will ever be as fun to heckle as Chris Mack. 99 of my top 100 reasons of wanting SLU to be in the Big East is to be able to yell at Mack again.

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I'm judging them based purely on sideline temper tantrums. Wade jumped to the front of the pack in that department last year. I don't know anything about their personal lives, other than I have always liked Martelli and his doppleganger grandson.

Shaka seemed like a respectable person, but he was always above the median in this department too.

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