Alexis McCoy, now a senior at Neshaminy high school, transferred from Harry S. Truman high school for the start of her junior year. The bomb threats, student fights, poor education and brawls between all the girls on the basketball team were more than enough to realize Truman wasn’t a safe learning environment for McCoy to stay in. However, the transfer wasn’t as easy as they thought it would be.
McCoy’s father had had enough and wanted his daughter to be safe in school. He rented an apartment in the Neshaminy school district so she could attend there, while still maintaining a home in the Truman district. “We thought everything was fine until my dad got a phone call or email and the athletic director at Truman said ‘we need an interview to make sure this isn’t an athletic transfer,’” McCoy said. She didn’t think anything of it, since it wasn’t an athletic transfer.
Her father ended up having to go to court with Mr. Magdelinskas to prove it was for educational and safety purposes. PIAA didn’t believe the McCoy’s side and didn’t allow her to play basketball.
“I was suspended for one year, so my whole junior year I couldn’t play basketball and that was really hard,” said McCoy. Not being able to play her junior year, generally the most important year for college, it had set her back. “Not being able to play, I had a couple D1 looks and totally lost them…” said McCoy.
Heartbroken and not knowing what to do since she wasn’t allowed to play basketball for the first year in her life since she was five years old, she had also found out some other news; “The head coach from Truman. My best friend. My dads best friend…we figured out she was the one that wanted me to get suspended. Broke my dad’s heart and he was so upset,” explained McCoy.
The only reason the idea of an athletic transfer was brought to the PIAA’s attention was because of her former coach at Truman which also happened to be her father’s best friend and someone she would consider family. “I feel like just because it was brought to PIAA’s attention, it was an automatic suspension,” McCoy mentioned.
“So I didn’t play basketball, they made me the basketball manager [at Neshaminy] and I had to sit on the side lines and record the games. That was really tough,” said McCoy. “After every practice I would be really upset… I know the games that we lost I would cry every time because I really wanted to play.”