I think I must set the record straight having worked at Carroll Academy.
1) Carroll Academy has a home gym with the Memphis Pyramid orginial home floor constructed in 2002. They did play 133 consecutive road games from 1998-2002. Carroll Academy has a waiting list of schools who have requested to play them.
2) The parents of students who attend there are under a juvenile court order to cooperate and participate as instructed by the staff of Carroll Academy as well as the juvenile courts, so a parental waiver is not necessary. Example: parents who have failed to pick up their children after games or who do not cooperate with the staff there have been jailed and forced to attend Friday night detentions at the school. On one occasion a parent who served a detention there received another detention for talking the next Friday night from Patrick Steele the school's ADT Security Supervisor. Parents are required to write off just like the students when they serve detentions.
3) Students including ball players must adhere to the school's strict dress code and most especially Coach Hatch's team rules. Players there can't sag their pants or wear earrings, necklaces, cornrows, have headphones inside the gym, and are frequently drug tested. Failure to comply with these rules usually means dismissal from the team or in some case being sent off to a residential lock-up facility since Coach Hatch is the Director of Carroll County Juvenile Court. In fact Coach Hatch issues each player team clothing apparell such as fleece tops and bottoms that must be worn to every game.
4) There has never been a fight at Carroll Academy between students in the entire history of the school. Fighting there is never tolerated. Staff members there are trained in CPI restraining techniques should students become aggressive or threatening toward staff. Those few students who become aggressive there usually end up with an appearance in front of Carroll County Juvenile Court Judge Larry Logan and leave with their bags packed.
5) Every year since Carroll Academy joined the TSSAA they have won a certificate for the TSSAA Sportsmanship Award (Doing What's Right). Believe it or not there are schools in the area who have NEVER EVER received this recognition. Carroll Academy has never had a player or coach ejected from a game in the school's history.
6) I realize Carroll Academy doesn't win a lot of games, but that is not necessarily the school's athletic program objectives. Carroll Academy has the smallest enrollment of any school in the TSSAA and has to rely on 8th graders just to have enough players to have a team. Carroll Academy does not have Jr. High or JV teams. I think Coach Hatch's boys team in 2002-03 did finished 13-16 eventhough they played several AAA and AA teams. Coach Hatch has said many times we will play anyone anywhere anytime. Often times players especially the girls team have never played organized basketball at any level. Also the team roster changes each year and sometimes during the season itself.
If you want to learn more about Carroll Academy and it's basketball teams, you might want to read a copy of Coach Hatch's book WINLESS WINNER available in bookstores throughout the United States and over the internet, or you just might see it on the big screen since Universal Studios Hollywood executives have called Coach Hatch about his book.
