Just three days before the outbreak of the coronavirus brought prep sports to a screeching halt for Chattanooga-area teams, Cleveland senior JaCobi Wood was all smiles.
Wood beamed as he stood on the floor of the Murphy Center at Middle Tennessee State University, proudly holding his state Mr. Basketball award after being named TSSAA Class AAA’s top individual player.
Little did Wood know at the time that his state-ranked No. 1 Blue Raiders would never get to step on the same court a week later and compete for their program’s first TSSAA state championship since the 1997 season as coach Reggie Tucker’s 33-1 squad was the heavy favorite to win it all in Murfreesboro.
Late in the evening of Thursday, March 13, 2020, the TSSAA announced that its girls’ basketball state tournaments for public schools, already in progress, were being suspended indefinitely and that plans for the following week’s boys’ public school tournament were also on hold due to concerns over what been declared a pandemic just that week.
Cleveland’s highly anticipated trip to the “Glass House” was washed away by COVID-19.