Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, September 30, 1993 TAG: 9310010072
SECTION: HIGH SCHOOL SPORTS PAGE: NRV-4 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: By RALPH BERRIER JR. STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: RINER LENGTH: Medium
Oct. 27, 1992, was supposed to be a big day for the Auburn High School girls' basketball team.
Having won nine of their first 13 Mountain Empire District games, the Eagles were heading into a big game at unbeaten Floyd County that Tuesday night.
"This was a good team we had," head coach Kevin Harris says. "It was big inside, strong, and very experienced."
It also was a close-knit bunch. Like most of the students in the tiny Montgomery County school, many of the players grew up together and lived just a few miles from the school.
At 2:30 p.m., the school day ended. Fifteen minutes later, most of the students, many of whom make their own commute, were homeward-bound via Route 8.
Ten minutes later, the news reached the school.
"I was in the office when a kid ran in and said, `There's been a car wreck,' " Harris recalls.
Approximately one mile from the school, at a dangerous intersection, a car containing three Auburn players - driver Teresa Hodges, Sherry Smith and Lori Lyons - had crashed head-on with a tractor-trailer that had swerved to miss another vehicle.
Harris got to the scene moments before the rescue squads arrived.
"When I saw the accident scene," Harris says, "I was worried that someone might not be alive."
Miraculously, none of the girls was seriously hurt. All three were treated and released at area hospitals.
"It all happened so fast," Smith says. "Me and Teresa said our choice of words, then it happened."
The accident shook the entire school. Many students who were heading home either witnessed the accident or saw the wrecked vehicle.
"I remember getting on the stretcher," Lyons says, "and it was like the whole school was standing up on the hill watching us."
The big game was postponed. Smith, the only person in the vehicle wearing a seatbelt, suffered only abrasions and missed just one game. Lyons, who received a gash in her chin that required 30 stitches, and Hodges were out longer.
The team, which already had lost starters Pam Sutphin and Kim Teel to injuries, was down to six players. The Eagles nose-dived. Their season ended at 12-8.
"We did the best we could," Harris says. "Basketball had taken a backseat in terms of importance."
Nearly a year later, Auburn has left the wreckage of last season behind. The Eagles are off to another fast start, having won their first six games before losing to Galax last week.
Lyons and Smith, now juniors, are playing well, each averaging about 13 points per game. Other players - such as center Ranay Gardner and forwards Holly Link and Jessica Janney - also are making regular contributions.
Then there's senior point guard Angie Simpkins, a 5-foot- 3/4 firecracker of a player who is scoring about 18 points per game. She and Smith run the floor and play oppressive defense, which usually translates into bucketsful of fast-break points.
Simpkins symbolizes the best traits of Auburn athletics: She's small and seemingly overmatched by bigger opponents, yet she presses on and succeeds with a gritty determination that's immeasurable. Not everyone can see that, however.
Simpkins was playing AAU basketball for the Roanoke Stars last summer when a coach told her she needn't concern herself with the idea of playing basketball after high school.
"He told me I didn't have much of a chance playing college ball because I'm so short," Simpkins says. "I said, `Thanks a lot.' It didn't really hurt to hear that, but it didn't make me feel good, either."
Harris, who played at Roanoke College when the Maroons were a Division II school, doesn't agree with the assessment.
"There's a place for her at the college level," Harris says. "There are three different levels of NCAA basketball, plus there's the NAIA and small colleges. There's a college out there that needs a player who can do the things she can do."
As for now, Simpkins, Smith, Lyons and the rest of the Eagles are happy just to be playing at all, and so well.
"I think it'll be us and Floyd in the regionals," Lyons says. "That's an attainable goal for us.
"The way I look at it, we never had a chance to do the things we could've done last year. Now, we can."
by CNB