Congrats UH Cougar Women Ballers 2010-11 C-USA Champs!

Had to give the University of Houston's women's basketball team a little TransGriot love today.   

They are having a fantastic season under their first year coach Todd Buchanan and after a 77-61 win over UTEP yesterday, clinched the regular season C-USA conference championship for the first time since the 2003-04 season..

That was the Cougars 13th straight win and the now 22-4 squad is only three wins away from compiling their first unbeaten C-USA conference run in their program history and only the second one in C-USA history since UTEP ran the C-USA table in 2007-08.

They have also tied their record for the longest winning streak in program history as well. .

Buchanan was an assistant coach at UH from 2000-2005 before taking the head job at crosstown Houston Baptist University.   His words about yesterday's C-USA clinching victory?  "Awesome," as he said to Houston Chronicle reporter Sam Khan. "That’s why I came back. I came back for a lot of reasons, but that’s one of the biggest reasons.”  

There's a whiteboard in the Cougars locker room that had three goals on it.   

*win conference
*go “16-0” in conference
*win conference tournament

They can check one of those goals off their whiteboard.    But there's two more I'd like to see them add.  

*Fill Hofheinz Pavilion consistently for women's basketball games. 

*Deep run in NCAA tournament

Congrats JJ Falcon Boys Ballers!

Back in the 2003-04 season my high school alma mater won the Texas Class 4A state basketball title for the first time since the 1964-65 season with a squad that included current NBA baller Daniel Gibson.

One of the things me and some of the guys talked about during our 30 year reunion a few months ago was that painful 1978-79 District 20-4A championship game showdown against state ranked Wheatley at Barnett Fieldhouse in which our state ranked Falcon squad lost on a slam dunk at the buzzer.     We finished 32-5 that year but didn't make the Class 4A playoffs because of a brutal district that not only included those Jackie Carr coached Wildcats, but had future Cougars Michael Young at Yates, Clyde Drexler at Sterling, and Rob Williams at Milby.

Many of us Falcons believed that if that team which had future NCAA high jump Rickie Thompson on it had made the playoffs, they had the talent to go all the way to Austin.  

I was pleased to read that my now 27-5 Jones Falcons have reclaimed the District 22-4A basketball title with a resounding 92-75 win Wednesday night over our longtime Wheatley Wildcat rivals to finish with a perfect 12-0 district mark  

The last time they won district was in the 2007-08 season, and they shared that title with guess who?

Now comes the Class 4A playoffs, and one thing that hasn't changed from my high school days is that the UIL's Region III (Southeast Texas) no matter what the classification is still a brutally competitive playoff route to navigate to get to the state championship game at the Erwin Center. 

Galveston Ball, Wheatley, Yates, La Marque, Humble and Terry are just some of the state ranked teams the Falcons will have to go through to get another bus ride to Austin and potentially play for our third state basketball championship.

But congrats Falcons!   Here's hoping you make a long run in this year's Region III-4A playoff and I get to see y'all hoisting the trophy in Austin again.

Aww, Number One Baylor Loses To Texas Tech

The Baylor Lady Bears played a tough Valentine's Day game against the Texas A&M Aggies and traveled to Lubbock to face a Texas Tech Lady Raider team that was itching for another upset of a top ranked team after knocking off  number 20 ranked Iowa State.on Tuesday.

Brittney Griner got her first dunk of the season, 15 points and six rebounds, but she and her number one ranked teammates shot a season low 25.9% and got slammed by the Lady Raiders 56-45 for their first loss in Big 12 conference play..   

It was 24-2 Baylor's first loss since they fell to UConn in November and snapped their 21 game winning streak.   The Lady Bears will probably lose the number one ranking as well when the new women's basketball poll comes out.


Oh well ladies.  Better to lose a game now than in the NCAA tournament next month.

The Eyes Of This Trans Texan...

Are still on the developing situation in Maryland and the toothless trans rights HB 235 that inEquality Maryland is peddling, and the efforts of their supporters to squash and attack any critics or criticism of the bill.


Hmm.   If y'all had done the right thing in 2001 instead of cutting transpeople out of the inclusive bill as you GL peeps always do, you wouldn't be feeling the heat now.

But it ain't just Moni griping about this jacked up travesty of a civil rights bill    I'm just one of many.

I'll be adding links to this post as I receive them.

If it's a Gay, Inc Explanation About Anything Related To Trans Law, It's Bullshit.

Dilemma Or Decision-Sandy Rawls Speaks

TransGriot Note: Sandy Rawls is the Executive Director of Trans-United in Baltimore.   

There has been an ongoing controversy in the trans community there and nationwide around the fact that Equality Maryland penned and introduced HB 235, a trans civil rights bill that does not cover public accommodations.   

Sandy made the decision to pull her organization's support for the bill and explains why in this guest post.

DILEMMA OR DECISION?

By Sandy Rawls, Executive Director Trans-United

As the executive Director of Trans-United, a grass-roots community based resource and advocacy program based in Baltimore I was faced with a tough decision.        

Do I support Maryland House Bill 235 or see it for what it is, a feel good tranquilizer that won't help my community, which a dilemma by all means.

Trans-United is a respected voice for many people in Baltimore City and Maryland.   But when Trans-United's voice is used to give political cover for a problematic piece of legislation,  the dilemma that is occurring is causing political and emotional backlash and discord in our community.  

It is also a dilemma that can have damaging consequences to the transgender community’s push for equal rights not only in our state but across the nation as well.. 

I've heard the various voices in our community expressing their concerns about Maryland HB 235 and the lack of public accommodations language.   I did as the executive director of Trans-United what Equality Maryland should have done in the first place before introducing this bill and consulted with the community and an attorney well versed in civil rights law.. 

After hearing from a majority of the community who have urged us to oppose the bill and having the attorney confirm that HB 235 would not protect the Maryland transgender community from discrimination,  I made the painful decision to withdraw Trans-United's support for this bill and oppose it.

While I am the Executive Director and face of Trans-United, this organization is a community based one first and foremost.    That means we belong to this community, not political endeavors who would seek to use it as cover for their political propaganda purposes or to push a bill that is harmful to the transgender community of Maryland.  .

The community should have had their voices heard by Equality Maryland before Maryland HB 235 was introduced, especially in light of the fact that the wounds still haven't healed from the transgender community being cut out of a previous inclusive bill in 2001 that only protects GL Marylanders.

Because that wasn't done and the current wording of HB 235 reflects that, I am deeply saddened that I can’t support the bill this session.    Perhaps those Equality Maryland people who are the lead advocates for the bill will learn from their mistake and try a more all inclusive approach next time.

My fears are also shared by the community that HB 235 will have a negative effect on future transgender community civil rights legislation.    If we try an incremental rights approach that we know has failed elsewhere and accept a flawed bill just to say we passed something,  I fear that when we try to amend this bill, an opposing legislator will say in the future, ”If public accommodation did not need to be in the bill back then, why does it need to be amended in now?”

What will we say in response to that question?
   .

This is why we need to have public accommodations language in Maryland House Bill 235 in this 2011 session, not 2012, 2013, 2014, 2020 or whenever Equality Maryland deems it important enough to push to amend it in.

And in the meantime while they dither, our community will continue to suffer from anti-transgender discrimination we desperately need legislative relief from.