2012-04-20 09:00:32

Neither Patricia nor Paula are going to be in class on Friday because their basketball team is playing in the state tournament in Sacramento on Saturday night.

(A) are going to be in class on Friday because their basketball team is playing
(B) are going to be in class on Friday due to her basketball team playing
(C) is going to be in class on Friday due to her basketball team playing
(D) is going to be in class on Friday because their basketball team are playing
(E) is going to be in class on Friday because their basketball team is playing

The correct answer is E

Explanation: As written, this sentence contains a subject-verb agreement error. The plural verb “are” does not agree in number with its singular subject “neither Patricia nor Paula.” When two singular nouns are joined by any word other than “and,” the noun remains singular, so “are” is inappropriate here. Choice E corrects this mistake by changing “are” to the grammatically correct and singular verb “is.”