In this file photo, a child talks to an adult through a fence just before the start of Signal Mountain’s season opening home football game. The Eagles were the 2010 State Champions for their division.Well that shocked exactly no one. When word came down that the TSSAA ordered Signal Mountain to vacate its six high school football wins and put the postseason almost certainly beyond the Eagles’ reach, an appeal seemed like a certainty.
That certainty became fact Tuesday when Dr. Tom McCullough told our newspaper’s Ward Gossett about their intentions. Now, what’s next? As of Wednesday night the TSSAA had not ruled and there does not appear to be a set timeframe.
With an extra day of perspective, let’s see if we can cover a collection of points:
* There appears to be hurt feelings that the TSSAA was informed Sept. 22 of the allegations that Signal Mountain’s Tim McClendon, a two-way starter, was believed to be ineligible. The TSSAA did not act until last Thursday, meaning even if the Eagles swept their last three games, they were going to need a lot of help to make the postseason. Well, the TSSAA has an entire state to overlook so dropping everything to inform Signal about the allegations seems a little presumptuous. Plus, if the TSSAA made it protocol to call schools as soon as every allegation before an investigation was made and told the school that Player X had eligibility questions, the weekly fallout would be overwhelming. If that was the expected policy, a team, player, coach, fan or custodian that didn’t want to face that stud running back at their rival school could call the TSSAA and drop a rumor hoping that the school would hold him out that week.
* There are questions about the Hamilton County Board of Education’s role in issuing a hardship waiver that said McClendon was eligible to attend Signal Mountain despite living in the Brainerd zone. Signal administration and Dr. McCullough are putting a lot of their appeal eggs in this basket, even using the less-than-veiled threatening language of “If the TSSAA maintains that board-approved hardships do not establish ‘territory,’ then there are numerous student athletes in Hamilton County and across Tennessee whose eligibility may be questionable,” in Tuesday’s release.