SIDELINES : Trainer Admits False Alarm

AUBURN HILLS, Mich. — Detroit Pistons trainer Mike Abdenour has pleaded no contest to a misdemeanor charge of making a false emergency report that a player had suffered a heart attack during practice.

Abdenour said Wednesday that he made the report to test the response of emergency personnel.

He apparently got the idea for the March 6 test after the death of Hank Gathers, a Loyola Marymount basketball player who collapsed during a game in Los Angeles two days earlier.

“I’m sorry this happened,” Abdenour told Rochester Hills District Judge James P. Sheehy. “I had my players’ best interests at heart. My intentions were admirable and honorable, but it was a poor lack of judgment.”