Editors, Vineyard Gazette:

As the aunt of one of the varsity girls basketball players on the Vineyard, I was appalled to learn about the behavior of the head coach and lack of responsiveness to parents’ complaints by the school administration.

A coach or teacher should never, under any circumstances, verbally berate a player, show favoritism of any kind or shame a player who she feels did not play as expected.

A student athlete should be involved in sports for one reason and one reason only — for the love of the game. Due to the actions of this obviously burned-out coach, students who love to play basketball and have been playing for many seasons now want no part of the game they used to enjoy so much. This is unacceptable.

As for the school administration’s failure to act and respond, this shows an utter lack of appreciation of the seriousness of the situation. Did no one question why players were withdrawing from the program? Did no one question why parents were complaining?

One bad educator is not worth the disappointment of so many fine young people who only wanted to participate in a sport they love.

Maria McCarthy

Woods Hole