The Locker Room March 27, 2010

For the past several years, former Pulaski County football standout Kirk Hendricks has been a busy man.  As a member of the Montgomery County Sheriff's Department, his duties include serving and protecting the people of the New River Valley.  Now, he is going to get the chance to do that in another way.  Hendricks has recently been named as the new Head Football Coach for the Veritas Sports Academy, set to open its doors in the very near future. 

The Veritas Sports Academy, which is headquartered in Greensboro, North Carolina, has made the decision to open new campuses in Christiansburg, Columbia and Greenville, South Carolina,  and Dayton, Tennessee.  According to the school's web site, "the mission of Veritas Sports Academy, Inc. is to assist in developing students who seek to play college athletics spiritually, academically, socially, emotionally, and physically by providing a Christian education in a traditional, college-preparatory setting." 

Veritas Academy offers both a high school and a junior college program, but will focus their efforts in this area on setting up a successful junior college program.  "Throughout the east coast, there are only a handful of junior colleges available to assist students reach their goals" said Coach Hendricks.  "From Florida to Maine, there are only four Junior Colleges that offer football as a sport.  Student-athletes that live east of the Mississippi have to go west to have a selection of schools to choose from in order to seek another opportunity to play football in college.  These are not bad students or bad athletes, they are kids that either didn't meet the NCAA academic eligibility requirements to play, or they simply went unnoticed by the college recruiters.  We hope to help them reach their goals both academically and athletically." 

Hendricks has spent the last several years as an assistant coach with the Christiansburg Blue Demons, but his ultimate goal was to find a head coaching position eventually.  "This is such an excellent opportunity for me.  I consider myself truly blessed.  My main goal with this is to not only be able to coach, but to help out some of the kids I've seen slip through the cracks over the years.  We have an incredible amount of talent in this area, and hopefully we will be able to help get a few of them to the next level." 

When asked what his first job as the new Head Coach would be, Coach Hendricks was ready with his answer.  "First we have to finalize everything for the school.  We're getting our facilities lined up and our classrooms ready.  Our team name will be the Virginia Crusaders, and I'm hoping to be able to have a say so in the team colors as well."  Hendricks admitted that his hope is to be able to dress his team in cardinal and gold.  "I'm an old Cougar who learned under Coach Hicks, and some things just die hard"  he joked.  "While we are starting this out with football, or goal is to expand to men's and women's basketball as soon as possible, and then expand into track and field.  The Academy is also looking at other sports, but this will give us a great starting point.  Once we get things going, we've got a lot of recruiting to get too."

Coach Hendricks is hoping to field a full team as soon as possible.  "I'd like to find 70-80 solid players to start things off with.  Our program is either a one year or a two year deal, so we want to make sure we work in some immediate depth for the ones that will leave after one year.  After we get our offices set up, I'll be contacting high school coaches to get information about students we may be able to help." 

As the Head Coach, Hendricks will not only be responsible for planning for the games, but helping market the players.  "We will work towards moving as many students as we can to the next level.  We hope to provide a Junior College opportunity to student athletes who fell short of fulfilling their dreams of receiving an athletic scholarship to further their education." 

More information will become available soon, but until then any questions may be directed to Coach Hendricks by email at kahx4@yahoo.com.