Women’s trailblazer entering AOA Hall
Posted on Friday, July 11, 2008
ROGERS — The calls here come from Iowa, Texas, Oklahoma and Arkansas. Women, trying to break into the world of basketball officiating, call the trailblazer.
That’s Lisa Pitts of Rogers, who tonight will be inducted into the Arkansas High School Coaches Association / Arkansas Officials Association Hall of Fame at the 14 th annual banquet in Hot Springs.
Pitts has called basketball games on all levels all over the country and halfway around the world for almost 30 years. Yet before she could even begin paying her dues calling junior high games, she once had to pay the price of admission to even enter a gymnasium.
“ Absolutely, ” she says when asked if she had to prove herself. “ I was blazing the trail the whole time and didn’t even realize it. I was just doing something I wanted to do. In the ’ 80 s — and records may show different — but I believe I was the only female in Arkansas for a long time. ”
Today, there are more women officiating than ever.
Pitts worked high school basketball for three years. Before that, she did a year at the Rogers Youth Center calling with Rick Stocker.
“ Once I got into officiating, college was my dream. I wanted to work women’s college basketball, ” she says. “ Of course, everyone wants the big show, Division I. ”
First, though, she worked what is now the 7 A state tournament — in Jonesboro — the first year she was eligible.
Her basketball career began on a farm in southwest Missouri, playing yard ball with her sister. She starred at Southwest High School in Washburn, Mo., where she graduated in 1977. She played one year at North Arkansas College on a basketball scholarship under coach Jim Stockton.
Pitts left college, and intensely missed the sport.
“ The only way for me to get back into it was officiating, ” she says. “ That was a way for me to still be a part of the game. ”
Along the way to eventually officiating SEC games, she created a lot of opportunities for women to follow her lead.
“ I believe so, ” she says. “ I’ve only realized that within the past year. I have several women trying to move up the ranks. They’ll call and ask questions, thank me for blazing the trail. ”
Those she’s helped locally include Rebecca Carpenter, Morgan Gomez, Jenna Cross and Vanessa Welch. Others live in Oklahoma and Texas.
“ I had a girl call me from Iowa the other day, ” she says.
Little do they know how tough Pitts had it.
“ When I first started you’d go into a gym, ” she says. “ There’d be a man and a woman there to officiate. They didn’t know what to do with me, where to put me. There were no dressing facilities. One would go in and dress while the other waited outside. ”
She showed up one night to call a junior high game.
“ The lady said ‘ That will be 50 cents, ’” she says. “ I said ‘ I’m one of the officials’. She said ‘ No, no. they’re already here. ’ I had to pay to get in. ”
Pitts had old-school coaches who were hard to deal with and has no earthly idea how many coaches she’s teed up.
“ That’s just part of the game, ” she says. “ Some coaches want it. Some coaches like to be teed, seriously. You know when they’re wanting it. Then you just tee them. ”
Pitts doesn’t know who nominated her for tonight’s honor. She was involved with the AAA 10 years before she quit doing high school sports and advanced to the college level.
She says she will talk Friday about setting goals, following dreams and surrounding ones self with good people.
She might also say it’s a good idea when you’re trailblazing to keep some pocket change on hand, too.
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