---

The Holiday Inn Express hotels in North Attleboro and Sharon must have been filled to capacity this week.

That's the only thing that might explain some of the comments that appeared under stories on our Web site about the Mansfield High School football team's troubles. A lot of those gems of wisdom came from people who thought they were a lot smarter than they actually are.

Very few seem to fully understand the issues that led to the Superior Court-issued restraining order against the Massachusetts Interscholastic Athletic Association that allowed Mansfield High's football team to compete in the playoffs, including Saturday's Eastern Mass. Division 2 Super Bowl at Gillette Stadium.

Like many other schools and individuals before it, Mansfield wasn't arguing the merits of the case, or denying the facts. Mansfield was arguing against the procedure involved in determining and confirming those facts - and because of that, it was impossible for Taunton Superior Court Judge John Connor Jr. to deny the restraining order.

In the week that followed, there was enough "he said, she said" nonsense on the Internet, here and elsewhere, to choke a cyberhorse. The conspiracy theorists were out in force, stopping short of placing Mansfield coach Mike Redding on the grassy knoll in Dallas. And I've heard from so many would-be barristers asking the Iran-Contra question of what the Hornets knew and when they forgot it, I'm ready to put in a call to Oliver North to clean up this whole mess. There are legitimate questions to be asked, but those are for another column. I'm not here to rain on anyone's parade today. There will be enough rain for everyone when the MIAA convenes a subcommittee of its Board of Directors later this week, and exacts its revenge upon Mansfield for whatever transgressions are deemed to have been committed.

But this will happen again.

And again. And again, and again, and again, until the MIAA gets off its high horse, tones down the arrogance a notch, and realizes that it has to formalize a procedure that allows accused parties to tell their side of a story before the wrath of God (or in this case, MIAA Executive Director Richard Neal) is cast down upon them.

It could be North Attleboro. It could be Foxboro. It could be anyone in the Hockomock League, Old Colony League, EAC, SCC, A-to-Z, whatever league you like. If they choose to fight the unwavering rigidity and of the MIAA in court, they will win.

What told me that Mansfield would have the chance to play on? There were two incidents in 1999 that are representative of the MIAA's faulty notion that it doesn't have to include the accused in its deliberations of rule violations.

During the 1999 MIAA Division 2-South girls' basketball tournament, Apponequet Regional High basketball guard Jenny Smith was involved in an on-court altercation with a Milton player. Both players were ejected, which carries an automatic one-game suspension.

Apponequet argued that Smith was defending herself from an unprovoked attack and should not have been ejected, but the MIAA refused to review the officials' decision (and the game films that proved Smith's claim), leaving intact the one-game suspension. The school and Smith's parents took the MIAA to court, got an injunction against the ruling because they were not given the opportunity to appeal the suspension, and Smith played on.

Apponequet won the D2-South title and eventually lost at the then-FleetCenter, but three months later, the MIAA stripped the Lakers of their sectional crown, ordered Smith suspended for the first game of her next season, and attempted to ban the school from participation in the 2000 tournament. The tournament ban was lifted under threat of further legal action.

Another similar circumstance came in the MIAA Division 3 boys' basketball tournament of that same year.

According to a report in the New Bedford Standard-Times, after the team from Old Rochester Regional High lost to North Cambridge Catholic in the state Division 3 semifinal, the MIAA ruled that NCC had used an ineligible player, and asked Old Rochester if it would replace NCC in the finals. Old Rochester agreed, scrambled to prepare and got ready to head to the game. In the meantime, North Cambridge Catholic went to court for an injunction and was awarded it because, again, the lack of a workable appeals process weakened the MIAA's enforcement of its own rules.

With Old Rochester now standing out in the cold, North Cambridge Catholic won the Division 3 crown. Not long after, the MIAA forced the school to forfeit all its wins from 1997-98 and 1998-99, including the state title win, because of the ineligibility of the player - who, apparently, was one of the best athletes on the team.

No doubt, NCC's transgression was a lot worse than having a fifth-year senior on the roster whose aggregate football experience was seven plays in one season of participation. There's no gray area in the MIAA's rules - maybe that should be addressed in the future - but it seems pretty clear to me and any other thinking person that an accused party should have the right to plead its case before "justice" is meted out.

In arguing on behalf of the MIAA in Taunton, attorney John Long said that it would have been "impractical" to convene the Board of Directors - a 17-member panel made up of educators, coaches and administrators from all over the commonwealth - on such short notice.

Perhaps that would have been true in 1808, when North Adams was practically the Seattle of its time. But this is the 21st century, where teleconferencing can span distances faster than a Mass. Pike toll-taker grabs for your money.

It would make sense for the MIAA to develop a sport-specific appeals procedure - maybe a panel of seven or nine coaches and administrators (chosen on a rotating basis from among all MIAA member schools so nobody feels unfairly burdened), whose charge it would be to make themselves available via conference call at a moment's notice, any day of the week, to debate and rule upon appeals in a swift and timely fashion.

Had that system been in place earlier this week, Mansfield could have stated its case, it would have been deliberated, and if the facts are what they're believed to be, Kurt Kummer and his North Attleboro Rocketeers would have been playing Bishop Feehan on Tuesday night.

I don't expect this idea to be warmly received by the MIAA. After all, its lawyer basically said at the end of his presentation (and I'm paraphrasing) that Judge Connor had no business sticking his nose into a private organization's business. That pretty much tells you where the MIAA is coming from in this matter.

Private organization? Yes. But one public mess after another is going to follow if the MIAA doesn't wise up.

MARK FARINELLA may be reached at 508-236-0315 or via e-mail at mfarinel@thesunchronicle.com. Read Farinella's blog, "Blogging Fearlessly," at thesunchronicle.com/farinella.