At Wednesday night's North Carroll girls basketball game, Panthers coach John Brown was a little nervous about a couple of things.

First, senior Caitlin Bach looked a bit nervous herself, going after the Carroll County girls basketball career scoring record. Second, Brown worried that he was running up the score to get Bach the 28 points she needed for an impressive milestone he wanted her to reach before the home crowd.

Bach got the record (1,516 points) after scoring 29, and the Panthers won 60-16 over Brunswick. Brown walked the fine line as well as he could have. He let Bach go for the record, but he did everything else to keep the margin within reason. He played his bench a good bit and took Bach out the second she got the record. He even sat her for a while in the second quarter.

Believe me, I have seen running up the score and this was not it.

I have seen teams press for an entire game when an opponent just can't handle the ball. Wednesday night, Brown pressed for maybe three minutes. Brunswick took a good number of shots. They just wouldn't fall -- especially early. Although the first half was 36-3, the second half was 24-13.

There were no signs of annoyance from the Brunswick side, where the coaches knew about the potential record. And there was no heckling from the stands. No one accused Brown of running up the score. He just couldn't stop thinking about it.

Those who really do run up the score don't think about it and they certainly don't talk about it. They don't talk about sportsmanship either. They think only about winning, not about someone else's feelings.

Brown should rest assured that just by worrying about how the Railroaders would feel, he showed his very strong commitment to sportsmanship.