A little respect, please?
When I read The News-Gazette's area prep basketball rankings on Monday I just wrote it off as another case of the local paper's ignorance of Uni athletics.
The top 10 included GCMS in the fourth spot -- a team that Uni ravaged by a margin of over 15 points. Uni was nowhere to be found on this top 10 list.
I noticed the fifth-ranked team was Unity, the very same team that Uni defeated by nine points in overtime last night.
And why did our wonderful local newspaper ignore Uni in its rankings?
Quite simply, they don't watch this team play. Anybody who follows Uni basketball knows that Uni clearly demonstrated its superiority over GCMS in that victory. That game was no fluke; based on its performance Uni would win that game nine times out of 10.
I understand that maybe The News-Gazette is hesitant to jump on any sort of Uni bandwagon due to the fact that Uni plays in the fledgling East Central Illinois Conference. Also, some of our teams in the past couple years have fallen below their potential. Boys soccer this year and last year fell victim to surprising upsets.
The Uni basketball team is different. Now that Uni has won its 14th straight victory -- its most recent against the supposed fifth-ranked team in the area -- it would be nothing more than a bad joke if this team did not receive the top 10 recognition it deserves.
David Boyle