High School Coach Suspended

LOS ANGELES (Nov. 30) - An assistant high school football coach was suspended for at least a year after he was caught on videotape moving a field marker to help his team win, school officials said.

The videotape shows the coach, Paul Bryan, improperly moving the marker to help San Pedro High School gain a first down on a critical play late in an Oct. 28 game. San Pedro scored on the drive and won the game against Gardena High School, 13-12.

"That was a pretty blatant act," San Pedro High Principal Diana Gelb said Tuesday. "In order to set an example and not be looking over our shoulders next season, it was important to send out a clear message that San Pedro is a place of academic excellence, sportsmanship and ethics."

Bryan, who has coached at the school for 23 years, declined to comment on the disciplinary action. He said last week that he expected a two-game suspension.

The videotape was shot for a rival school that was scouting the game.

Gardena assistant coach William Berry said the punishment was appropriate and "shows people you can't do something and get away with it."


"That was a pretty blatant act."
-Principal Diana Gelb

Devin Carter, a running back for San Pedro, also felt the discipline was proper.

"It makes us look bad," he said.

San Pedro won the Marine League title and advanced to the quarterfinals of the L.A. City Section playoffs before losing to Sylmar High School last week.

Gelb said Bryan will continue working for San Pedro High's special education department while serving his football suspension, which will be reviewed by the league.

Horrible how some act, these are high school kids just let them go out and play the game.

This guy has been coaching for 23 years how many times has he done something like this.

Here is a couple of questions that I have on the situation. I was wondering if he just moved the down marker, or what exactly. I saw a small clip, but it wasn't clear what he was moving. I can understand if it was the clip that marks the yard line as a reference for measurement. If it was only the chains, then they should have been able to go back to the clip anyways.

The other problem is isn't it illegal for an opposing team that is not competing in the game to film this game. That brings a whole nother question as for why the rival school is not being penalized.

That is exactly what I thought. By just moving the chain there should have been no problem because the clip should have been there to return it to the proper spot. The filming part of your question would depend on each state's association rules. California must let them video their opponents.

Yeah, I thought that the filming issue may just be in the VHSL handbook. I wasn't sure if every state was the same, and I am not fully surprised that they do allow it outside of VA.

Va doesn't have a rule against filming another team either, it is not done usually as a gentlemans agreement not to.

I was thinking that the VHSL does have guidelines against it. I may be mistaken though.

No it is not a gentlemen's agreement. There is guidelines about filming for the purpose of scouting. It can be found on page 205 of the VHSL Handbook Policy 300-16-3. Here is the site:

http://www.vhsl.org/Handbook.pdf

We checked and couldn't find anything on it last season. The only thing in the manual is about using it during a game like at halftime or using photographs and such. This is to keep it fair among schools because most don't have the money backing to get the technology to do it.