Tell Us Coach.

You wouldn't expect a lot of laughter in a huddle in a basketball game where you are down by 19. You wouldn't expect your coach to be the one causing the laughter either. Over the weekend, during our game to tie for first place in the Ivy League, the least thing that I expected in fact happened. In a huddle, down by 19, the team bursted out laughing, yet again at Coach's expense.

Trying to motivate us, which Coach does in the weirdest of ways, Coach decided to tell us what the opposing team supposedly said about us before the game. Stumbling for words, and turning bright purple as usual, she started screaming, "DO YOU KNOW WHAT THEY SAID BEFORE THE GAME? DO YOU REALLY WANT TO KNOW WHAT THEY SAID?" The team sat there and anticipated what we assumed to be some grave insult that we would never be able to forgive. Instead, Coach said something that she doesn't realize girls in our generation hear everyday, probably more than they should.

" 'LET'S KILL THESE F**KING B*TCHES!' THATS WHAT THE SAID, I SWEAR, WE HEARD THEM SAY IT. THEY SAID IT, I SWEAR. I HEARD THEM."

No one was doubting you, Coach.

The second she said that, things got so incongruous and awkward that the team could only react with laughter. Coach sounded uncomfortable saying it, she looked uncomfortable saying it, and she was acting as if that was the worst insult you could ever say to a group of girls. She was trying so hard to motivate us, but she had no clue that it was just going to make us laugh instead. We were desperately looking for something to lighten the mood anyway, so we took advantage of the moment.

Coach is an older woman trying to fit into and relate to a generation in which she just doesn't belong. She digs herself into this deep holes where what she is doing cannot possibly be taking seriously. It instead just makes us feel so awkward and so confused that we just have to laugh. Maybe our laughter was to relieve the tension we felt from playing what was looking to be a horrible game, or maybe we laughed cause we actually wanted to cry at our situations instead. Whatever the deal was, however, we laughed, and the game took a turn for the better after that timeout.