Maurice Washington III is a star running back entering his junior year of high school. However, the CIF is currently preventing Maurice from playing football at his home school, Oak Grove High School in San Jose, California, because it claims that he transferred to Oak Grove for athletically motivated reasons.
Maurice attended The King’s Academy in Sunnyvale, California, beginning in the 9th grade, after allegedly being recruited to attend due to his athletic talent. Now that he wants to leave, King’s Academy filed a protest with the CIF, trying to prevent Maurice from playing football at Oak Grove, ironically claiming that he transferred there for athletic reasons.
Maurice was reportedly unhappy socially and academically at King’s Academy. But the school claims that because his mother was unhappy that a teacher/assistant football coach was fired by the school, that his decision to transfer was “athletically motivated.” The CIF bought this argument and has ruled Maurice ineligible for his entire junior year.
The CIF’s current bylaws provide that if a student transfers based on “athletic motivation,” they are ineligible to compete at their new school for one year from the date of transfer. While the term “athletic motivation” is not defined, the CIF provides several non-exclusive factors that could lead the CIF to deem a transfer to be athletically motivated. One of the various factors is evidence of parental or student dissatisfaction with a coach or coaching decision. As a result, Maurice, a 2015 Max Preps All-American as a sophomore, will now lose his entire junior year of eligibility.