Basketball coach shakes hands with air after opposing team walks away
Things got heated during Tuesday night’s basketball game between Siena and Rider as a brouhaha late in the contest led to four technical fouls being assessed.
The Daily Gazette reported that a player from each team was ejected from the game, which Siena won 78-68.
Rider coach Kevin Baggett and his team left the court without shaking hands with Siena coach Jimmy Patsos and his players. Not that it mattered. Patsos took part in the handshake line by himself:
Siena wins 78-68. Rider walks off, no handhakes. Jimmy Patsos does the handshakes on his own, anyway. pic.twitter.com/iV4Ko2zmWo
— Michael Kelly (@ByMichaelKelly) January 18, 2017
“Things got out of hand the last couple minutes,” Patsos told the Daily Gazette. “Thank God nobody got hurt.”
The teams got into a shoving match after a hard foul, and then Patsos and Baggett started yelling at each other. That, in turn, led to the invisible handshake line.
“I decided to not shake hands because I didn’t want anything to escalate again between the teams,” Baggett told ESPN. “That’s my prerogative to protect my team whether anyone else thinks it’s good sportsmanship or not.”
Pete Grathoff: 816-234-4330, @pgrathoff