Wiggins’ old coach stuck in stands
Vaughan teacher under sanction by group representing referees
Vaughan Voyageurs senior boys basketball coach Gus Gymnopoulos has been missing from the team’s sideline all season but hopes to return by the end of this month.
The basketball program that produced NBA star Andrew Wiggins has fielded yet another strong team, compiling a 21-4 overall record and gearing up for one more run to the provincial championship tournament in March. But Gymnopoulos can’t join them on game days until he overturns a sanction, levied by the Ontario Association of Basketball Officials, that he says renders him radioactive to his team.
Gymnopoulos, a phys ed. teacher at Vaughan Secondary School, isn’t suspended by any organization with direct authority over coaches, but after a disagreement with officials following a playoff game last spring the OABO has ordered its members to walk out of any game Gymnopoulos coaches.
For the OABO, the issue is workplace safety. President Jaime McCaig says referees shouldn’t worry about harassment while officiating games.
But for Gymnopoulos the issue is jurisdiction.
The OABO doesn’t govern coaches, so he feels their directive is a de facto coaching ban and an overreach.
He’s still free to organize and supervise practice, and coach from the sideline in games outside Ontario, but he hopes to have ruling overturned and the sanctions erased from his record.
Gymnopoulos and his lawyers have filed for a judicial review and Jan. 21 a judge will conduct a hearing in a case could change the trajectory of Vaughan’s season and help define the limits of administrative power over high schools sports.
“To overstep their jurisdiction . . . that’s troubling and disturbing,” says Gymnopoulos., who coached the Wiggins-led team that won a provincial title in 2011. “You can’t have an outside organization telling a school board who can coach their teams.”
Last March 10, Vaughan and Sir John A. MacDonald of Waterloo played a closelycontested game during the OFSAA 4A championship tournament.
Over the game’s final 90 seconds officials whistled Vaughan for four different fouls, disallowed a free throw over a lane violation and callied travelling on a breakaway layup. MacDonald committed just one foul over that span, took the lead and won 55-53
Immediately after the game, ac- cording to court documents, Gymnopoulos approached officials Marty Bourgeois and Robin Holbrook to discuss the pivotal foul calls.
Gymnopoulos and assistant coaches maintain they never raised their voices or harassed officials.
Later, Gymnopoulos posted a series of tweets criticizing the late-game officiating.
“I’m tired of @ofsaabasketball be- ing used as training grounds for officials who aren’t ready,” he tweeted after the game.
“We are not a practice session and deserve the best.”
The outburst precipitated a series of emails to Gymnopoulos and his assistants and culminated in a disciplinary conference call, which resulted in the OABO banning Gymnopoulos, who is also a referee, from officiating games until April 2017.
The OABO also ordered officials to walk out of any game Gymnopoulos coached for two years.
Assistants Claude Nembhard and John Glezakos both received yearlong sanctions.
McCaig says the court case prevents him from speaking in detail about the reasons for the ruling, but says Gymnopoulos inflamed the situation by posting on social media.
“We have a disciplinary process and we have to keep our members free from abuse,” McCaig said. “It’s going to be up to the courts to decide.”
McCaig says the OABO has no plans to lift the sanction against Gymnopoulos unless a judge instructs them to.
Until then Gymnopoulos will continue running Vaughan’s practices and confronting awkward moments when he has to explain why he’ll be sitting among the spectators once the game starts.
“How do I have this conversation every time?” Gymnopoulos says. “You’re in the gym and you’re not allowed on the bench?”