Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, July 22, 1993                   TAG: 9307220123
SECTION: SPORTS                    PAGE: B1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: HAMPTON                                LENGTH: Medium

GIRLS WHO PLAYED IN THE VIRGINIA HIGH SCHOOL

The association sponsored games in boys' and girls' basketball, softball, baseball and football last week in Hampton.

Hilary Hyser, who graduated this year from Midlothian High School in Chesterfield County and will attend Virginia Commonwealth University, said the girls received unequal treatment in practice space and such tournament perks as shoes and transportation.

"We felt like we were blatantly discriminated against the whole time we were there," she said. "There were just a whole lot of little things, but the biggest thing was the shoes."

Adidas gave the boys' basketball team free shoes. The girls' team had been promised free shoes by association officials.

"They called us probably three weeks before the game and asked what size we wore," Hyser said.

The shoe company would only provide shoes for the boys, however, and no other company offered to outfit the girls, she said. Tournament director Mike Smith told the girls he didn't feel everyone should be penalized, so he permitted the boys-only distribution, Hyser said.

"It was one of the things where if all of us weren't going to get it, none of us should have," she said.

Smith, football coach at Hampton High School, couldn't be reached for comment.

A spokesman at the U.S. headquarters of Adidas in Portland, Ore., said the company doesn't make a women's basketball shoe.

On a tournament-sponsored trip July 10 to Busch Gardens in Williamsburg, the boys' teams traveled on air-conditioned buses. The girls' basketball team rode in a school bus without air conditioning, Hyser said.

The East and West girls' basketball divisions practiced in the same gym at the same time; the boys basketball divisions each had a gym for practice.

The Virginia High School League, which sanctions the VHSCA games, will meet with association officials to ensure equal treatment in the future, said VHSL programs director Claudia Dodson.

"We don't want that sort of thing to happen," she said. "That's not fair to the kids."