The decision of a youth basketball association is making waves in Virginia.
Charlottesville’s national travel basketball team made it to the championships, but when the team showed up to compete, they were disqualified because there is a girl on the team.
For Kymora Johnson, basketball is more than a game.
“I like competing and playing against other people, and challenging myself to get better,” Johnson said.
The 10-year-old was excited to travel to Myrtle Beach this weekend with her team, the Charlottesville Cavaliers, to compete in the National Travel Basketball Association Championship Tournament.
The team was disqualified heading into the semi-final round after a team they had previously beaten complained about Johnson being on the boys team.
“So what we have a girl on team?” Jessica Thomas-Johnson, Kymora’s mother, said. “If she can compete with these boys, as she’s done since she was 5 years old, and hold her own and drop threes and break ankles, then who are you to tell her she can’t play with them.”
Kymora, her mother and her coach all said that when the Cavaliers checked in the team was told they were allowed one girl on the roster.
“He said, ‘You are eligible to play, you’re good, you’re fine. You can sit back down,’” Kymora said.
However, the NTBA denied that is the case, saying its rules clearly state girls and boys must play with their own gender in the championship tournament.
In a statement, they said, “Once we realized the coach chose to play her, they unfortunately had to be dismissed from the tournament since they played with an ineligible player.”
By Sunday, word of the team’s disqualification had spread and support began to grow.
Kymora’s teammates ever wore pink shirts in silent protest on Sunday.
As for Kymora, she is just focusing on her game, because she’s not done playing any time soon.
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