Odds and Ends from the Wide World of High School Sports

What kind of year has it been in high school sports around the country? So glad you asked. Here's a sampling of the quirky and absurd culled from newspapers and wire services:

Burnside, Iowa: Indianapolis Colts tight end Dallas Clark was ejected from a girls' basketball game for berating officials from the stands. The state playoff game pitted Clark's alma mater, Twin River Valley, against Southeast Webster-Grand. Southeast Webster-Grand won.

Marathon, Fla.: Marathon High School decided it would not play against rival Archbishop Curley-Notre Dame for at least a year after an incident at Curley in which Marathon's junior varsity girls' basketball players drank water containing ammonia -- possibly urine -- from a cooler that Curley had provided.

Pikeville, Ky.: Allen Central High School agreed to remove the Confederate flag from its gym after officials from David School, a private high school, threatened not to play a basketball game because they said the flag was a form of taunting to its black player. The David coach alleged that Allen Central fans had waved Confederate flags at the player in a game last year. In an interview, an Allen Central cheerleader referred to her black friends as "colored," earning her "Third-Worst Person in the World" distinction from TV commentator Keith Olbermann.

Lawton, Okla.: City workers spent two nights dropping poisonous pellets into prairie dog holes because the animals had been burrowing on the Lawton High School athletic fields and at a neighboring park. The move drew protesters who considered the practice cruel and the aluminum phosphide pellets dangerous to humans. "We don't want some kid going back on a fly ball, worrying that he might step in a hole and break his ankle," a city official said.

Cold Spring Harbor, N.Y. : A referee on hand to call a game at Cold Spring Harbor High was arrested on charges of endangering the welfare of a child after a girls' basketball player told police that the official had made inappropriate comments to her about her feet and allegedly followed her down a school hallway.

Dexter, Maine : A boy who wore the Dexter High Tiger mascot outfit said he was attacked by fans in a back stairwell after a girls' basketball game, but because he was wearing the mascot head, he could not identify his attackers. The incident began when he felt someone pull on the costume's tail. When he turned around, he was hit in the face, resulting in a bloody nose.

Colonie, N.Y. : An eighth-grade wrestler from a private Christian school said he would forfeit his opportunity to compete for a state title if it meant wrestling either of the girls in his weight class. "The Bible talks about youth, lust," the school's athletic director said. "The sexual attraction starts in junior high, and to put a boy and a girl together grappling and grabbing each other for holds, we just don't think that that honors the Lord. We feel it's wrong for our wrestlers to wrestle around and grope and grab a young lady."

Boca Raton, Fla. : Jon Kaweblum, the athletic director at Weinbaum Yeshiva High School, designed a kippah (a Jewish skullcap) with two clips sewn under the fabric to keep it in place, making it easier for athletes to wear during competition. Bobby pins are considered a hazard by some state high school associations . . .

. . . such as in Buena, N.J., where two Woodrow Wilson female athletes who were going immediately from their track and field sectional championship to the prom were told they could not compete in the 400-meter hurdles because they had bobby pins in their hair. One girl's mom helped remove hers so she could compete. The other girl, who had run the second-fastest time in South Jersey earlier in the season, was unable to remove her pins.

Powder Springs and Zebulon, Ga. : The McEachern High School wrestling booster club and the Pike County High athletic director each hired private investigators to tail athletes to prove that they were ineligible to compete at the schools they attended because they had not legitimately established new residences. The work done by the investigators resulted in disqualifications for the athletes and forfeits for the events in which they competed.

Gainesville, Fla. : Because of gender equity concerns, the Florida High School Athletic Association said it will test flag football and softball players for steroids along with football players, baseball players and weightlifters.