I've seen what happens when parents try to lie for their kids. Or when they don't realize they're lying for their kids and the truth comes out..OOoh it ain't pretty. I get not wanting to share every detail about life...but having grown up in sports, I've heard SO many excuses and watched them fall apart, I'm naturally suspicious.
We also had a Monday practice on a day off from school. Coach checked with everyone to make sure they all had rides (as some parents had jobs and might not be able to make it)..and if not, they had both the Head Coach, My mom's #, heck even MY #, so no excuses. Sure enough, 3 girls (all of whom are friends) didn't show up..their mother tried to tell our coach it was HER fault that she didn't wake them up in time, because she thought practice was later. No dice..my coach said 'There are 3 of you. All 3 of you knew the time you had to be here. All 3 of you have cell phones..all of those phones have alarms. You are capable enough to know WHEN you are supposed to be here, and WHAT TIME you have to get up to do so. It is not the mother's responsibility to wake you up. It is yours.' Needless to say, the punishment for missing a practice before a game is conditioning AND you don't get to play. The game just so happened to be a game we needed to win, and girls we needed to play well. Nope, they had to sit on the bench and watch the team get HAMMERED (One game was 25-1, only because the other team's server missed the court), all the while watching their team knowing they weren't contributing. Think it drove the message home a bit..
Although I wonder- For those coaches who have access to facebook/social media: If you catch a lie on a person's facebook, how do you address it? Say they told you they have MOUNDS of tests, but then they check in at the mall? How do you handle that?