narbonne

SoCalHoops College News Report

It's Official: Narbonne Girls Forfeit City Title;
State Title In Jeopardy--(May 7,1998)

We earlier reported that the Narbonne girls' team was going to forfeit their title for using ineligible players according to City Section Commissioner Barbara Fiege. Narbonne appealed from that earlier decision. Yesterday the results of the appeal were made public, and it was announced that the Harbor City Narbonne girls' basketball team lost their appeal to have the City 4-A championship reinstated.

And now the word is that they could be in jeopardy of losing their State Division I Championship as well.

A three-member City Section panel heard the appeal and voted to uphold all parts of the April 17 decision of the City Section's rules committee. That earlier decision stripped Narbonne of the title because the team used ineligible players, and held that the girls' basketball program would be unable to participate in the playoffs next season; it also placed the school on two years' probation, in addition to ruling three individual players ineligible for one year because of residence issues. Junior Portia Mitchell and sophomore Raimi Mitchell, sisters, were ruled ineligible retroactive to March 2. Sophomore Syreeta Stafford was ruled ineligible retroactive to Feb. 20.

Narbonne administrators, girls' basketball Coach James Anderson, Janice Mitchell--the mother of the Mitchell sisters--and Frank Williams, an attorney representing the Mitchells, presented their appeal on Tuesday to the panel, which also included Section Commissioner Barbara Fiege.

Anderson said he was "shocked" at the refusal of the panel to reverse some of the sanctions. He said that Narbonne will appeal the decision to the state office of the California Interscholastic Federation and will go to court, if necessary.

"Why do these people think that our principal and everybody is lying?" Anderson said. "We gave them an electric bill, rental receipts and other documentation. We gave them the paperwork they asked for."

Jack Hayes, executive director of the state CIF, could not be reached Wednesday, but on April 17 he said that Narbonne could lose its state title if all of its appeals fail. Jim Duel, a spokesman for the CIF, said an appeal to the state office "could take some time, maybe extending into August."