The Fayetteville High School girl's soccer team ended their season with a big disappointment-- after an athletics board denied their appeal for tournament eligibility. This all started when the team learned one of their players didn't live within the Fayetteville school district-- automatically disqualifying her and the entire team from the state tournament. The girls told us they got the news after practice on Tuesday. "Pretty much everyone just broke down. Everyone was devastated because it's what we'd worked towards all season," says junior player Elizabeth Trumbo. "The whole season was building up to it so it pretty much meant everything and it was kind of our last time to be together as a team and prove that we are a good team," senior Julie Spies says. Their athletic director told them one of their team mates was ineligible because she lived in Rogers. The team appealed to the Arkansas Activities Association-- which has the power to reverse the teams ineligibility-- but the board denied the appeal, preventing the Lady Bulldogs from playing in the tournament in Conway. Even though school administrators take full responsibility for the mistake, the girls say apologetic words don't mean much right now. "The only punishment they're getting is having to take the blame. They're not being restricted from doing anything whereas this is the end of our high school season and we have to take all the punishment for their mistakes," says Spies. "We all just can't even believe that it's happening to us when we had nothing to do with it at all, it was all adult responsibilities that weren't taken care of," Trumbo says. The girls told us they have no hard feelings towards their team mate. They say they understand it wasn't her fault and say the silver lining of this whole experience is that they've grown closer as a team. "Since we found out...we wore our jerseys to school, we got a petition together, we really have come together as a team," says junior Abby Graupner. Ironically, next weekend Fayetteville is set to host the final game of the tournament. "Honestly I doubt any of us will go. If they want us to work it then have the administrators work it, I mean, we should be playing not working it," Graupner says.
