Title: Boone to Address All-Met Athletes

URL Source: https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/sports/2001/06/01/boone-to-address-all-met-athletes/f20fa76b-1276-437a-b1d6-644d00d8080e

Published Time: 2001-06-01T00:00:00.000Z

Markdown Content:
Herman Boone, the former T.C. Williams football coach whose team was the subject of the movie "Remember the Titans," will be the keynote speaker at today's 15th annual All-Met luncheon, which will honor more than 300 All-Met athletes of 2000-01.

Boone, 64, was named coach of the Titans in 1971, the same year that the city's three schools -- T.C. Williams, George Washington and Hammond -- merged as part of a massive desegregation plan. Boone, who had served as an assistant at T.C. Williams, got the job over Bill Yoast, the older and more experienced Hammond coach. Despite the tension surrounding the team, the Titans went 13-0 and won the AAA state title, and in the process found a home in the hearts of the people of Alexandria.

This year's Donald Huff Award will be presented to Claudia Dodson, an assistant director of the Virginia High School League for the past 30 years, for her unheralded service to high school athletics. Dodson, 59, has been essential to the advancement of girls' high school athletics.

When she joined the VHSL in 1971, only a few public schools in Virginia had organized sports for girls and one girls' state championship -- gymnastics.

But much has changed since then thanks to the efforts of Dodson, who from 1971 to 1980 was the VHSL staffer in charge of girls' sports. Today, there are 31 state championships in girls' athletics.

Another award recipient today will be Washington Capitals forward Jeff Halpern, who will be honored with the Distinguished All-Met Award. Halpern, a Potomac native who briefly attended Churchill High, has 39 goals and 71 points in two seasons with the Capitals.