.png)
NCHSAA names Hayesville coach Tammy Dills Special Person of the Year
By Travis Dockery
Sportswriter
HAYESVILLE, NC — Hayesville High School coach Tammy Dills has been named the North Carolina High School Athletic Association’s Region 8 Special Person of the Year, an honor presented at this week’s NCHSAA regional meeting.
The Special Person Award is given in each of the association’s regions to someone who has supported the NCHSAA and its mission to serve member schools and student-athletes. It is not limited to a single title or job description. For Dills, that description has always been broader than a roster or a scoreboard.
Dills is head coach of Hayesville’s varsity and junior varsity volleyball teams and varsity Lady Jacket basketball. She has been a fixture in the Yellow Jacket athletic program for years, working at every level from youth leagues through varsity. A 1990 Hayesville graduate, she has spent much of her adult life back in the same gyms and on the same courts where she grew up.
Her reputation as a coach is well established. Players and parents know the demanding standards, the competitive edge, and the expectation that effort is not optional. Those who have been around the program longer know the other half of the story just as well: Dills routinely goes beyond the job description for her own athletes, for families in the community, and even for opposing teams when the moment calls for it.
That combination — high standards on the court and a willingness to help off it — is what the Special Person Award is meant to recognize.
The award put a statewide stamp on work that Hayesville has seen for a long time.
In a small school, one coach often wears several hats. Dills has worn them across sports, age groups, and seasons. Youth players who first met her in elementary or middle school have later played for her in high school. Some of those same athletes have watched her treat a visiting team with the same courtesy she expects from her own.
Comments