Accompanying Photos

File photo (News & Record)

Photo Caption: Former Page High School defensive end Gabriel King.

GREENSBORO — After a series of legal twists and turns, Gabe King's quest to play high school football is over — at least in North Carolina.

The executive committee of the N.C. High School Athletic Association on Wednesday unanimously rejected King's appeal to have his athletic eligibility reinstated for his senior year.

King has a choice: Stay at Northern Guilford for his senior year or immediately transfer out of state — possibly back to his native South Carolina — to play football.

He wants to play in the Army All-American Bowl, an invitation-only game in January that attracts the nation's top high school seniors. But participants must have played football their senior year.

King said he has an idea of what he wants to do, but is holding off announcing his decision until later this week or early next week.

"I want to make sure what's in my heart is in the best interest of my future," he said.

Despite losing his eligibility, King has remained the state's most coveted defensive player. He has received more than a dozen scholarship offers from colleges across the country and has narrowed his choices to California, Alabama and Oregon. He said he is leaning toward California, but wants to make his announcement on ESPN this fall.

King was ruled ineligible in the spring by the NCHSAA, which determined that he supplied Page, the high school he was attending at the time, with a false address in July 2008.

Earlier that summer, King's parents moved to Winston-Salem. Instead of joining them, King moved in with his adult sister in an apartment within the Page school district — the address he gave when filling out an athletics participation form.

Lawyers for the NCHSAA again argued Wednesday that King's parents never transferred legal guardianship of their son to their daughter, making him ineligible to attend Page. King's parents moved back to Greensboro within Northern's attendance zone earlier this year, and King transferred there in April.

King had a brief reprieve when his eligibility was restored last month by a temporary restraining order allowing him to practice with the Nighthawks. That order was overturned by a Superior Court judge a week later. The NCHSAA agreed last week to hear King's case, a rare appeal granted by the group to an individual.

King said he was disappointed with Wednesday's ruling, but was grateful to be allowed to present his side.

King and his mother, Patricia Hughes, reiterated their claims of last spring that Page football coach Kevin Gillespie, assistant coach Norman Weeks and athletics director Rusty Lee knew King was living with his sister and never told him he was ineligible.

"All of this is based on a lie to protect Page," Hughes said. "I talked with Norman Weeks. He called me up and asked me where Gabe was living. I told him the truth. He knew, Coach Gillespie knew, Rusty Lee knew. They all knew, but never said a word about it being wrong. Now they aren't man enough to admit it."

King said Page officials — he declined to identify them — told him to write his sister's address on the participation form.

"It's been tough," he said. "I don't want to get into bashing Page's coaches because I still care about them. I'm disappointed in them, but I still care about them."

Lee did not return a reporter's phone calls. Gillespie and Weeks said they been instructed by Guilford County Schools officials not to comment.

King's case may have led to change within school district. Greensboro lawyer Chris Justice, who represented King, criticized the school system's old athletics form, saying it was poorly written and did not specifically ask if the student was living with his parents or legal guardian.

This year's participation form leaves little room for ambiguity. It asks for the address of the student, the student's mother and father, and, if applicable, the legal custodian.

"Hopefully," Justice said, "this will avoid a lot of the confusion and mistakes that got us here in the first place."

Contact Robert Bell at 373-7055 or robert.bell@news-record.com