Saturday, August 29, 2009
GREENSBORO — Former Page High football player Gabe King won a court battle Friday, but his athletic future remains in doubt.
A Guilford County district court judge granted King’s request for a temporary restraining order, reinstating the eligibility stripped by the N.C. High School Athletic Association last spring.
“I think it’s wonderful news,” said Patricia Hughes, King’s mother. “It’s been a long struggle for everyone, especially Gabe, to get to this point. But we also know it’s not over.”
Far from it. Judge Angela Foster’s ruling allows King to practice and work out with Northern High — King transferred there in April — but little else.
State athletics association rules require football players to practice with their team for nine days before they can play in a regular-season game.
Foster scheduled a second hearing for Sept. 9 to hear from the athletics association, which was not present at Friday’s hearing.
If a judge sides with King and upholds the injunction, King could play in the Nighthawks’ Sept. 11 game against Northwest Guilford.
If the request is rejected, King, a senior defensive end, would be ineligible to compete in any athletics programs at the school.
Lawyers for the athletics association did not return phone calls Friday. Que Tucker, its deputy executive director, could not be reached.
Foster’s ruling comes five days after a pair of Northern Guilford basketball players failed in their bid to have their eligibility restored. On Monday, Superior Court Judge Shannon Joseph ruled that the parents of Asad Lamot and J.R. Gant had not exhausted all of the administrative remedies afforded by the school system to appeal their children’s reassignments.
Guilford County Schools attorney Jill Wilson said Foster’s ruling would not affect the 12 students at Northern who have been ruled ineligible this year for providing false addresses. She declined to elaborate.
The state high school athletics association last spring banned King from playing sports for his senior year after Page officials turned him in. According to court documents, King and his parents lived within Page’s district until June 2008 when his parents moved to Winston-Salem.
Instead of moving with his parents, King moved in with his older sister in a Pisgah Place apartment in the Page district.
According to court documents, King and his mother told Page coach Kevin Gillespie and assistant coach Norman Weeks he was living with his sister. Court records also claim various unnamed Page football coaches gave King rides to his sister’s apartment after practices last summer.
Documents also allege that on July 29, 2008, King filled out an athletics participation form for Guilford County Schools, and that Gillespie and Weeks told King to put down the address where he was living.
King’s lawyer, Chris Justice, said Friday the association’s eligibility rules are confusing, particularly when it comes to defining “legal guardian.”
“The wording is sloppy,” he said. “They certainly don’t artfully address what the rules are.”
Court documents contend Page officials reported King’s possible ineligibility to the NCHSAA on March 12 after Internet sites began questioning King’s eligibility.
The suit also alleged that Tucker alone ruled King was ineligible, a violation of the state association’s regulations requiring the executive committee to determine eligibility.
