News-Record.com

A few e-mailers have accused us of disrespecting Dudley High School basketball because we published a story on the day of the state championship game about a former player who transferred from the school. Here's what one reader said:

"Where's the "Gate City" love? At a time when the local newspaper should focus on motivating the home team to a state title, staff writer Kellie Dixon chose to focus on Prince Bowden, a player that quit the team and moved away. The article was a deliberate attempt by Dixon to foster negativity around a successful team. The only Greensboro team to make it to the State Championship game, gets a front page story about a former teammate who abandoned the team for selfish reasons. It was poor timing and distasteful for the paper to run the article the day before the championship game. This was unfair to Dudley's basketball program to be distracted with such nonsense while preparing for a title game."

I'm guessing this is a one-day online reader and not a newspaper reader. We published beau coup stories about Dudley's run to the state championship and on Sunday, the day after they won it, a photo and story on the victory took up well over half of the front page of the Sports section.

I understand the complaints, though. The article we published Saturday about Prince Bowden leaving the team was less about Dudley's march to the championship and more about one young man's struggle to find his place. In the end, it sounds like both he and Dudley are better off. Here's how it starts: "PITTSBORO -- Prince Bowden expected Dudley to return to the state championship game. The senior hoped the Panthers would. After all, most of those guys are his friends."

In any case, the story hardly seems as if it was a distraction, as Dudley won its second state championship.