The Waterbury Democrat., 1941-02-21
RULE PASSED IN 1S4O PROTECTS
 LOCAL SCHOOL
Not Necessary to Notify GIG. at Start of Bas-
 ketbaII Season
BY JOHN A. CLUNEY
 Sports Editor

When Walter B. Spencer, execu- tive secretary of the Connecticut InterScholastic Confernece takes a few minutes off to read the rules of the conference of which he is secretary and 8 ormer president, he may discover to his complete sur- prise that WiIby High schools 1940- Al basketball team cannot be bar red from participation in the state "A" tournament on a "technicality" of any sort.
 At any rate, that is the interpre- tation that must be put upon the situation, which, in view of he lat est rule of the c. I. c. relative to eligibility of teams in the state basketball tournaments, passed in May, 1940 at meeting in Hamden, Wilby, a "B" school at the time because it had less than 500 boys registered, needed to do nothing more than schedule 50 percent of it's 1940-41 basketball games with "A" schools ad win 50 percent of them to be eligible for the "A" tour nament at the New Haven Arena which gets under way next Monday, February 24th.
 May Rule Applies
 According to Coach Jim Lee of Wilby, whose eyesight is quite nor- nal, there is nothing in the rules of eligibility passed by the c. I. c. executive committee last May at Hamden, relative to notifying the conference at the beginning of the season that Wilby wished to play in the "A" meet Secretary Spen- cer's contention that Wilby should have notified the conference last September that it washed to play in the "A" meet is apparently based on 1888 rule which has been super seded by the committees vote of last May and which, more import antly, appears on the c. I. c. bulle- tin for that month.
 Incidentally, MT. Spencer told the writer this morning that he, per- Sonally, was in favor of Wilby's en- try into the tuornament, but warn ed that he "could not speak for the entire committee" which numbers ten headmasters, not including Principal Joseph P. Kennedy of Wilby, who is, however a member of the conference with which Wilby has been represented for several years.
 A hearing of the matter has been schedule for early this afternoon in New Haven where Principal Ken- nedy, armed with the May, 194O bulletin of the conference will pre- sent his schools side of the matter and contend that under the c. I. C.'s own rules, 1t was not necessary for Wilby to notify the conference last September that it wished to compete in the "A" tournament. On the surface. the entire matter is quie tempest in g. teapot" for Wilby expects to compete in the tournament on the contention that it has not violated, even in spiri, any rule of the conference.
 Rules are rules" said MT. Spen- cer today, which is what is expected to be pointed out to him this af- ternoon. Principal Kennedy could not be reached today for a state ment as to whether or not he would autograph the May 1940 bulletin for MT. Spencer, who probably has one of his own somewhere in the files of the conference he repre- SentS.
 The rule in question is essentially as follows: Teams of lower classi- fication wishing to participate in the "A" tournament must schedule at least 50 percent of its games with "A" schools, and, to be Eligible for the "A" tournament, must win at least 50 percent of those games"