Your Stories

Gender: Female
Grade Level of Event: 10th grade
Sport Played: Basketball
Your Story: I had a coach throw her keys at me when I didn’t like how I was playing in practice. She then cornered me in the empty locker room with the captain of our team, who was 2 years older, screaming and swearing at me that I was an “f—-ing cry baby!”

Gender: Female
Grade Level of Event: 9-12
Sport Played: High School Volleyball
Your Story: I have watched two daughters play volleyball under what can be only be described as a ‘toxic’ program. The coach admitted this year to the players that she is working on her anger. From what I have witnessed, it is clear that she should not continue to coach our youth. I have watched my girls (and many others on the teams over the last 3 years and this season) be frowned at, eyes rolled at, laughed at, talked about on the sideline, talked about in front of and to other girls on the team. They are also either yelled at openly, or completely ignored by facing her back to players during team talks. She repeatedly benches players without giving explanations and she gives negative feedback to players when they lose to another team. In fact you can visibly see her entire demeanor change when a loss becomes imminent. She sometimes shuts down and stop interacting entirely. The negativity is beyond understanding and I can see that it taking a toll emotionally on the team. They are fearful of her and as they lose joy for a sport they love, they are afraid to speak up. The worst part is that she is a teacher in the school district and friendly with the high school athletic director, so students and parents have never spoken up because they do not want retaliation on the court. At the end of last year a parent asked (via email) if anonymous feedback to the program be made by a the creation of a simple form but the athletic director chose not to reply.

Gender: Female
Grade Level of Event: High School
Sport Played: Unknown
Your Story: I’ve had this assistant coach since freshman year. She’s always been awful to me, but this week she took it too far. I had a college visit set up and reminded the assistant 5 times. The day before I was to make my visit, I again reminded he that I would miss practice the next day. Suddenly, she says I have to go to the Head Coach. I tried to reason with her but to no avail.

I ended up emailing the Athletic Director about this which the assistant found out about and during a subsequent bus trip, I was called to front of the bus where I was made me sit next to her as she yelled at me and shoved her phone in front of my face. In frustration, I said I was wrong to email the AD but she still wouldn’t allow me to leave her. I felt really anxious and upset and when I was finally got back to my seat, I had to use my inhaler. This is just one of the incidents with this coach.

Gender: Female
Grade Level of Event: 12 years of my childhood
Sport Played: gymnastics
Your Story: i was always skinny. my coach would find anything to tear me apart. she told me i looked anorexic, and that my body embarrassed her. constantly comparing me to the way my teammates looks and would make sure i hated everything about myself. she downloaded a weight watching app on my phone at age 11.

Gender: Male
Grade Level of Event: Varsity
Sport Played: Football
Your Story: The coach rode my classmates hard, but the upperclassman seemed unphased by it. Coach berated one player and then belittled him in front of the team for the entire two-hour practice because he came in last in a relay. He never came back to the team, others soon followed. I worried I would be next.

Gender: Male
Grade Level of Event: College
Sport Played: Lacrosse
Your Story: I had an absolutely atrocious coach my freshmen year. What we did is we got the team together, and a couple of the seniors about 1/4 of the way through the season brought him a list of everything we wanted him to change and/or do better.

He didn’t change and basically told those guys to screw off, so we complained to the AD and he said there wasn’t much we could do at the moment.

Gender: Female
Grade Level of Event: High School
Sport Played: Cheer
Your Story: My coach played favoritism by race and the relationship she had with the kids’ parents. Even though other team members had better skills, her favs were chosen as captains and were always front and center.

Gender: Female
Grade Level of Event: 8th
Sport Played: Soccer
Your Story: I was playing select soccer for a well known and “renowned” male coach. He coached boys high school and recently started coaching girls. He was beyond demeaning and used belittling language towards all of us as motivation. He coached with fear and the sport was no longer a safe place for me.

Gender: Female
Grade Level of Event: Sophomore
Sport Played: Cross Country/Track
Your Story: I told my coach I was going into treatment for anorexia and had to leave the team. After treatment she agreed to let me do less mileage. At a meet the next season I didn’t do very well and at the finish line she yelled at me saying I needed to run more and eat healthier if I wanted to be fast.

Gender: Male
Grade Level of Event: High School
Sport Played: Tennis
Your Story: My coach threw a racket on my head during a drill.

So basically, I was working on my volleys (lawn tennis) during a session and I was missing quite a lot. My coach was upset and just lost his cool and threw a racket at me. I did get better after that, but according to him my volleys still suck.