History of Lady Chieftains
Before the hiring of Jerry Richardson, the Lady Chieftains were a losing basketball team at Shiprock High School. Interest was low in the girls basketball program and rival school Kirtland Central High School had been the state champions for 8 consecutive years. Richardson set out to change this attitude among the Navajo community of Shiprock. To quote him "I had never been associated with anything that lost. We had to change some attitudes.".
The year was 1987 and the Lady Chieftains did well enough to reach the state championships versus Kirtland Central. After a close game, the Lady Chieftains lost during overtime. The next year however, the Lady Chieftains came back to the state championships and in another close game, were able to defeat their rivals to become the new state champions
The Lady Chieftains, according to the director of Rocks with Wings essentially become one of the first events that help unite the Navajo community of Shiprock.
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“Much wondering to see upon all hands, of wattles and woodwork made,
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And a small and a feeble populace stooping with mattock and spade,
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While in this place and that place, with bodies unglorious, their chieftains stood....”
—William Butler Yeats (1865–1939)