Slay has made no decision
- Updated: October 26, 2014
Donoho coach responds to ‘career is over’ tweet following Falcons’ volleyball tournament loss
By Al Muskewitz
East Alabama Sports Today
Mark Twain once wrote how reports of his death were exaggerated and that’s the way Donoho volleyball coach Janice Slay sees similar reports relating to her coaching future today.
Shortly after Slay’s team was eliminated from the Class 1A North Super Regional in a tight five-game match Saturday, a message on her son’s Twitter account sent ripples through the Falcons’ community indicating “mom’s coaching career is over.”
On Sunday, Slay, who just completed her sixth season with the Falcons, texted her players’ parents saying she didn’t know about the tweet and had not made any decision on her future.
“If I had anything to say it would be to quote Mark Twain – ‘the reports of my demise are greatly exaggerated,’” Slay wrote in a message to East Alabama Sports Today Sunday. “Coaching volleyball for me has never been about me and really never been about winning or losing so I’m not sure why anyone would care what decision I make to continue or not. I’m just not that interesting.
“My whole focus has always been seeing that young women have the opportunity to participate and excel in sport, and to help them understand the relationship between sport and life. The Lord has blessed me in allowing me to coach and has placed me in positions where I have had the opportunity to be involved with some amazing young women and I have learned as much from them as I ever tried to teach.”
Slay, a successful coach at Jacksonville State before coming out of retirement to continue Donoho’s volleyball tradition, reiterated she has not made any decision on her future with the program.
The loss Saturday to Athens Bible prevented the Falcons from reaching the championship round in Birmingham for the first time since 2008. In the previous three years, they have won two state titles and were last year’s state runner-up.
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