Leading off today: Two assistant football coaches at a Connecticut high school have been charged after a player collapsed during conditioning drills on Tuesday, the Hartford Courant reported.

   Police said they were summoned to Middletown (Conn.) High School at about 7:30 p.m. Tuesday and found players lifting weights and running in the extreme heat. The session was cut short when an unidentified player collapsed while sprinting up a hill; he was transported to Middlesex Hospital, which did not have information on his condition.

   After an investigation, Christopher K. Ellis, 26, and Joshua Hamilton, 29, were charged with second-degree reckless endangerment, a misdemeanor. Police reported the temperature at the time was 93 degrees and that no water was provided for the players.

   Middletown has been without a head coach since June, and AD Mike Pitruzello could not be reached for comment, the paper said.

   Under Connecticut rules, strength and conditioning training is allowed over the summer under adult supervision as long as no activities specific to the sport -- such as blocking and tackling drills -- take place.

   Recent grad mourned: Hundreds of teens and other area residents paid respects yesterday to recent Horseheads graduate Ryan Scherer, who died in a one-car accident July 4.

   Scherer, 18, was a three-year varsity soccer player at Horseheads and also played lacrosse.

   "No matter who you were, he was always going to be a friend," Chad Corkins, 18, told The Star-Gazette. "No matter what you did ... he'd still want to be one of your good friends, and I loved that."

   Back in action: Christ The King rising junior Omar Calhoun is back on the basketball court for the AAU New York Gauchos two months after a blow to the mouth sent him to the sidelines.

   He averaged 26 points over a trio of games Thursday and Friday at the Roundball Classic.

   Playing in Los Angeles in the spring, Calhoun took a shot to his mouth that loosened several teeth, requiring that his mouth be wired shut briefly.

   Despite the setback Calhoun has a long list of suitors including Arizona, Florida, Louisville, Pittsburgh, Villanova, Virginia and West Virginia. Calhoun told the New York Post he plans to cut down his list to between five and eight schools after his junior year.

   New on the site: The all-state baseball team in all five classes was released yesterday and can be viewed here.

   I've also added some files and updated others in the site's reference library, which is hopefully the best compilation of records, results and trivia anywhere for New York high school sports. I still have some catching up to do on basketball and football and will continue beefing up those reference pages over the summer.

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   Speaking of football, NYSSWA member Steve Grandin has been assembling the week-by-week schedule for the upcoming season. The first draft of the schedule is now posted on RoadToSyracuse.com if you're aching to start planning your autumn weekends.

   What are they thinking? Gannett's ill-advised obsession with battling the Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic Association continues.

   The newspaper chain and the Wisconsin Newspaper Association filed a notice of appeal last week of a federal court decision that upheld the rights of the WIAA to regulate Internet coverage of state tournaments.

   The WIAA sued after The Post-Crescent, a Gannett newspaper, streamed video of four 2008 football playoff games without authorization. Gannett and the WNA agrued in court that the WIAA is a public institution constitutionally required to provide media access.

   Western District Judge William Conley rightfully ruled that the WIAA's exclusive contract with a Madison-area company to provide Internet streaming of postseason events does not violate newspapers' constitutional rights.

   The courtroom battle now shifts to the U.S. Court of Appeals Seventh Circuit in Chicago.

   For the life of me I cannot figure out what Gannett is thinking. If their Wisconsin editors are so confident that they're right, let's see them try live video streaming of a Green Bay Packers game or an NCAA basketball tournament contest in Milwaukee.

   Video streaming is not to be confused with traditional reporting, still photography or even live blogging. Streaming is low-grade (but improving) broadcasting, and it's clearly established that broadcast events have real value.

   I genuinely respect Gannett's work over the years to champion sunshine laws, etc., but this isn't a First Amendment case. In fact, it's not even close. If Gannett is so eager to stream WIAA events, tell them to pony up the money to buy the rights.