In this Feb. 21, 2015, photo, a referee talks to Riverdale high school coach Cory Barrett, left, and Smyrna high school coach Shawn Middleton during a high school basketball game in Murfreesboro, Tenn. Both teams were pulled from the postseason for trying to lose a game to avoid the top-ranked team and improve their chances of advancing to the state tournament. Riverdale and Smyrna both played to lose Saturday night. They both lost Monday afternoon.
Riverdale and Smyrna — two of the more renowned girls’ high school basketball programs in the state — played in a district consolation game last weekend, and each tried so forcefully not to win that the referees chastised the coaches and threatened to forfeit each team.
Monday afternoon, the Tennessee Secondary School Athletic Association suspended each team, ending their seasons and ultimately giving them what they strived to accomplish Saturday.
“You can’t make a mockery of the game. I’m a former principal. I asked both principals in our meeting today how they felt about it and they agreed with me,” TSSAA executive director Bernard Childress told the TFP on Monday. “What kind of message are you sending to the kids? It’s like in life, we have a challenge ahead of us, but we don’t like that challenge so we’ll avoid it by being unethical. That’s not the message we want to send.”
Smyrna trying to hand Riverdale the ball back. Then intentionally getting called for a backcourt violation. @tssaa pic.twitter.com/hkBPJIpEY7