SCHOOL OF CHAMPIONS: LSA wins AISA Chairman’s Award

After finishing third in the running for last year’s AISA Class AAA Chairman’s Award, a prize given to the AISA school that demonstrates the best athletic program as a whole, Lee-Scott made it a goal to wind up on top this year.

“At our very first staff meeting, we discussed that we wanted to make the Chairman’s Award a priority,” Lee-Scott Athletic Director Bobby Samford said. “It gave us something to look at and kind of drive us every day.

“We said, ‘Let’s try to make this happen.’”

Three state championships and three runner-up finishes later, the Warriors were named the 2008-09 recipient of the Chairman’s Award on Monday.

All the eligible teams are awarded certain point values for the number of varsity teams they field, the number that make the playoffs, how those teams finish in the playoffs, and the number of individual athletes who sign college scholarships and earn All-Star selections or student-athlete awards.

Lee-Scott scored 750 points, outpacing second-place Pike Liberal Arts by more than 200.

The Warriors could have given back all of their first- and second-place team finishes and still had enough to win.

“This award is reflective of your entire athletic program, top to bottom,” Samford said. “It’s particularly special because no one area could win this award by itself. And I think that’s a strong commentary on what we’re trying to do for our kids.”

Lee-Scott started off 2009 with its first girls basketball championship under coach Chad Prewett, with Jessie Washington earning AISA Player of the Year honors and Washington and Olivia Maddox making the All-Star team.

In April, the Warriors under coach Kathy Barrett followed it up with their fourth boys tennis championship in five years, with Taylor Hardy winning the No. 2 singles championship and Will Hester and James Diskin winning No. 2 doubles.

Three days after the tennis title, the girls track team under Franklin Smith wrapped up its first state championship, with Melissa Maddox earning MVP of the meet and Lillian Goodman breaking two state records.

Lee-Scott also finished runners-up in boys track, golf and softball in the spring.

And that’s not to mention the Warriors’ four JV state titles, which didn’t count for the award standings: cheerleading (coached by Emily Severin), volleyball (Liz Underwood), girls basketball (Corye Ivatt) and track (Smith). The Warriors’ JV boys basketball team (Steve Darden) was also runner-up.

Samford said he hopes this year’s success serves as a jumping off point for the school’s athletic programs.

“We’re really not satisfied with staying there, because I feel like we have the potential to do that every year,” Samford said. “We want to get better. We want to use this year as a model, but we want to keep going from here.”

Samford said the school’s slogan for the year, both academically and athletically, has been a Bible verse from Colossians: “Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart.”

And he said the Warriors’ athletes and coaches certainly have lived up to those words.

“Everybody has really embraced that verse, and that’s how we approached the year,” Samford said. “It’s been a special thing.”

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