Sports Getting Out of Hand

Being from a suburban Utah city, there was rarely what we would call a big moment of social unrest or a breakdown of authority. However, similar to what one might observe at a BYU sporting event, we did have moments of overzealous behavior in our own sporting events. At one particular basketball game I had the "wonderful" privilege of being apart of one of these in a local basketball game.

I have a friend who was considered the Goliath of the local basketball league. Being six feet and seven inches, he instantly became a target at a lot of our games. In one game, he had a moment of temper and fist may or may not have been thrown. There were mixed emotions everywhere.
Teammates were appalled by the opposing team's moment of violence. Parents were yelling at the players and the refs as they held a huge interest in the safety of their sons. The refs, unfortunately were not very experienced, and were not able to adequately to settle down the energetic crowd and players.

Luckily, my friend's dad was the coach. He was almost as tall as my friend and definitely more broad. He directed his attention to the source, his son. Because of his wisdom to calm down his son, rather than directing his attention to the other's team aggressiveness to his son (because really, he did get hit hard), he was able to show what really mattered in the game. I learned that are some cases where focusing on the problem, rather than focusing on the bigger picture, can create an environment that gets out of hand. Good leadership directs our attention away from the petty things and toward the greater good.