PISCATAWAY, New Jersey— A leading radio talk show host suspended for two weeks for making derogatory racial comments about a collegiate women’s basketball team stressed yesterday he was not a racist. But the team’s coach struck back hours later, calling the comments “racist and sexist remarks that are deplorable, despicable and unconscionable.”Don Imus, host of “Imus in the Morning” enraged many by referring to members of the Rutgers University women’s basketball team as “nappy-headed hos.” The term “nappy-headed” is a derogatory way of referring to the hair of some black people, while “ho” is slang for “whore.”

Rutgers women’s basketball coach C. Vivian Stringer condemned the remarks at a news conference, but players stopped short of saying whether they thought Imus should be fired, as some civil rights leaders have demanded.

“These young ladies are the best this nation has to offer, and we are so very fortunate to have them at Rutgers University,” Stringer said of her players. “They are young ladies of class, distinction. They are articulate, they are gifted. They are God’s representatives in every sense of the word.”

“It’s not about them (players) as black or nappy-headed. It’s about us as a people,” Stringer added. “When there is not equality for all, or when there has been denied equality for one, there has been denied equality for all.”

Team forward Essence Carson said the team had agreed to meet with Imus.

In Washington, White House spokeswoman Dana Perino was asked if President George W. Bush thought Imus’ punishment was strong enough.

“The president believed that the apology was the absolute right thing to do,” Perino said yesterday. “And beyond that, I think that his employer is going to have to make a decision about any action that they take based on it.”

Imus’ comments struck a chord, in part, because it was aimed at a group of young women at the pinnacle of athletic success. They came a day after the team, which includes eight black women, lost the NCAA women’s championship game to Tennessee.

“What I did was make a stupid, idiotic mistake in a comedy context,” Imus, known for his caustic tongue and comments that routinely offend, said on his show yesterday morning, the final week before his suspension starts.

He tried to shift some of the focus from himself, saying the terms were used commonly by blacks. “I may be a white man, but I know that these young women and young black women all through that society are demeaned and degraded by their own black men and that they are called that name.”

Imus, who has made a career of cranky insults in the morning, was fighting for his job. He continued to apologise Monday, both on his show and on a syndicated radio programme hosted by civil rights activist the Rev. Al Sharpton, who is among several black leaders demanding his ouster.

Imus had been trying to set up a meeting with the team to apologise, but said he did not expect forgiveness. Of the two-week suspension by MSNBC and CBS Radio, he said:

“I think it’s appropriate, and I am going to try to serve it with some dignity.”

Sharpton, who also appeared on “Today,” called the suspension “not nearly enough. I think it is too little, too late.” He said presidential candidates and other politicians should refrain from going on Imus’ show in the future.

Still, Arizona Republican Sen. John McCain, whose presidential candidacy has been backed by Imus on the air, said he would still appear on Imus’ programme.

“He has apologised,” McCain said. “He said that he is deeply sorry. I’m a great believer in redemption.”

The latest comments could raise some serious questions about the future of the show, particularly if the outcry against Imus drives away advertisers, say industry experts.

While he is ranked the 14th most popular radio talk show host by the trade publication Talkers, his audience is his audience is heavy on the political and media elite that advertisers pay a premium to reach. Authors, journalists and politicians are frequent guests — and targets for insults.

Imus or his cast have called Colin Powell a “weasel” and New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson a “fat sissy.” He and his colleagues also called the New York Knicks a group of “chest-thumping pimps.”

On Sharpton’s programme, Imus said that “our agenda is to be funny and sometimes we go too far. And this time we went way too far.”

On his show Monday, Imus called himself “a good person” who made a bad mistake.

“Here’s what I’ve learned: that you can’t make fun of everybody, because some people don’t deserve it,” he said.

“And because the climate on this programme has been what it’s been for 30 years doesn’t mean that it has to be that way for the next five years or whatever because that has to change, and I understand that.”