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Credit: David Butler II-Imagn Images, Reuters Images
The Indiana Fever franchise is dominating WNBA discourse once again, this time due to a dangerous play involving reserve guard Sophie Cunningham and Chicago Sky guard DiJonai Carrington.
In Saturday’s Fever-Sky game, Carrington struck Cunningham in the face and sent her tumbling to the floor while attempting a chase-down block. Carrington was assessed a flagrant 2 foul and ejected for the play. After the game, debate raged on whether Carrington made the play with malicious intent or if it was just a normal hard basketball foul.
Ironically, Fever head coach Stephanie White was in the group that didn’t believe there was malicious intent.
“Look, it was a hard foul,” White said. “It did happen, and I thought it was the right call. One of the things about [Carrington] is that she’s going to play her butt off, man. She’s going to compete. Nobody’s going to go walking in for a layup. I don’t oppose the hard foul, but I also don’t think that she intentionally went for the neck.”
“Defend your players.”
On Monday, Barstool Sports founder Dave Portnoy appeared on Wake Up Barstool and made it crystal clear how he felt about White’s stance.
“Stephanie White, I’ve been a defender, the coach of the Fever, get her out of there, get her out of there, fire her *ss today. I don’t want her back on that bench. Stop defending the other players.
“‘Oh, she plays hard. DJ, that’s just her being her.'”
“Defend your players,” Portnoy implored. “First of all, you’re wrong. It was a dirty play, and she’s gone, but when do you ever seen in like the NBA a coach not defend their own players… I don’t care if you agree with it or not; you’re wrong, but it starts to make me think you care more about the overlying social issues and not pissing off other people in the league…
“This isn’t politics; your player got assaulted. Defend your player in the press conference. Be like, ‘Yeah, that was a dirty play; she should’ve hit the showers.’ She acts like she’s the coach of the other team. I don’t care if she’s the best Xs and Os, which she’s not, get her the hell out of there. Either defend your players or get lost.”
Considering White got the Fever within an overtime period of the WNBA Finals last season despite her team being depleted by injuries, the chances Portnoy gets his wish, and White is ousted, figure to be extremely small. Still, it’ll be interesting to see how she manages Indiana’s emotions heading into the rematch with Chicago on August 23.
The post ‘Fire her today’: Dave Portnoy slams Fever coach for not defending Sophie Cunningham appeared first on The Comeback: Today’s Top Sports Stories & Reactions.
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