11 kids, 3 houses and parents saying they wanted to help: What happened with Myers Park football
The parents of Myers Park quarterback Lucas Lenhoff have found themselves at the center of one of the biggest high school sports controversies Charlotte has seen in recent years.
Steven and Carla Lenhoff told The Charlotte Observer that they moved 10 kids, along with their son, from Southern California, Texas and Georgia to Charlotte last year to play high school football. They were not trying to create a national powerhouse or break any rules, they said, when they rented three houses in the Myers Park district for the students to live in.
Myers Park, one of the largest and oldest high schools in North Carolina, had to forfeit all of its fall 2021 football games after new principal Robert Folk performed a January investigation into eligibility after getting a tip from a Myers Park parent.
The Lenhoffs say that only one of the 11 players they helped enroll at Myers Park has earned a football scholarship and that their son will likely have to walk on at a college next fall.
“What upsets me is people say we brought a bunch of ringers out here,” Steven Lenhoff said. “Well, outside of one kid — and Lucas was probably the most well-known — besides the color of their skin, how were they ringers in football? A lot of kids didn’t even play. They hadn’t played varsity.”
The Lenhoffs are white. The players they brought with them are Black.
Folk said eligibility forms had been intentionally falsified by parents or guardians to make it look as if the students were eligible. Upon further review, Myers Park had at least three players, from in and outside of North Carolina, who should not have played last fall, NCHSAA commissioner Que Tucker told The Observer.
Folk self-reported to the NCHSAA and Myers Park was penalized, losing all of its games in addition to nearly $7,000 in fines and penalties.
“Based on my review and my conversations with (Myers Park),” Tucker said, “I determined, with reasonably doing your due diligence as a school staff, that information was available to make the determination that these (supplied eligibility) documents don’t line up ... and with the fact that some students were from other states, those were yellow flags.”
This was not the outcome the Lenhoffs had hoped for when they were trying to give their son a chance to keep playing football, they said.
The football connections
The Lenhoff’s sons, Neal and Lucas, both played football, and Steven Lenhoff said to find the best brand of football in the Los Angeles area, where they were living, you had to play in the inner city.
In areas like South Central Los Angeles, the Lenhoffs, who say they run a multi-million dollar graffiti-removing business and had means financially, saw families with little and wanted to help. Among the kids they said they helped was an 8-year-old who the school alerted them had missed three weeks of class.
Steven Lenhoff said he went to the child’s house and knocked on the door.
“He was skinny as all hell and just filthy,” Lenhoff said. “And I say, ‘Where’s your mom?’ He said, ‘She’s been sleeping.’ Well, she’s been ‘sleeping’ over three weeks.’ ”
The Lenhoffs took the kid in. That was more than 10 years ago and the child is still with them. They added another later on from a similar circumstance. Both played football.
Everything was fine until COVID hit. Lucas Lenhoff wanted to keep playing football, but California ended high school ball during the pandemic.
Lucas grew up training with and playing 7-on-7 against familiar talents such as Clemson’s DJ Uiagaleleli and Alabama’s Bryce Young, the Heisman Trophy winner and national champion.
But when the coronavirus shut down California high school football in the fall of 2020 and a spring season looked bleak, Lenhoff didn’t want to sit out. With his parents’ permission, he began looking for places to play in states that were going to have football seasons in the spring of 2021.
He landed on North Carolina and Myers Park High School, which had a potential quarterback opening when All-American Drake Maye decided to leave school early and enroll at UNC.
For the Lenhoffs, leaving California — while financially feasible — would present challenges.
The move to the Southeast
The Lenhoffs made the leap and brought their family with them. It was mom, dad, Lucas and the two other boys from California who had lived with them for years. But there were other kids who the Lenhoffs say had become part of their “extended family.” Carla Lenhoff said her husband — who often met players during 7-on-7 events throughout the country — was approached by at least 30 additional players, including some from Florida, about potentially coming to Charlotte.
“So we decided to (move to North Carolina),” Steven Lenhoff said, “but if we leave, these kids (in California) have nothing. That’s where they live. That’s where they sleep. So we took some of these kids and we knew other kids that came with their parents.”
Lenhoff said the spring season went well. Carla Lenhoff said that then-Myers Park coach Mark Harman came by the house to make sure the address of the home they had was in the district and double-checked that everyone was eligible.
Harman declined an interview request from The Observer.
Lucas Lenhoff had a terrific season in the spring of 2021, throwing for 1,977 yards and 29 touchdowns in 10 games, the most of any Charlotte-area player, and he helped lead Myers Park to the N.C. 4AA state semifinal game, the furthest any Myers Park team had ever reached.
“The kids were here and we had a great time,” Steven Lenhoff said. “But there were a lot of kids back home who our house was their only refuge. We have a pool house (in California) and our house is the house where everybody goes.”
In the fall season, the Lenhoffs say they leased two more properties in the Myers Park district and six more players moved to North Carolina. The three homes have a total of 15 bedrooms. The Lenhoffs said those parents signed over temporary custody but also spent time in Charlotte.
In the other two houses, the Lenhoffs said, there were always adults there — parents or family members of the players. The kids, they said, were never unsupervised.
“(Those parents or guardians) couldn’t rent houses because of the area and the cost,” Steven Lenhoff said. “People wouldn’t rent to them. L.A. people that are not white over here, it’s just difficult. I’m sorry. Charlotte is a different world and we’re not used to it. But that’s just the reality.”
The Lenhoffs allowed The Observer to interview two players who are living with them under the condition the students are not named. Neither had played football the two previous years before they landed at Myers Park.
The first player, who is a 17-year-old senior, said that in a span of one year and seven days, he lost both parents to cancer. When his mom died, he said he had nowhere to go. He had played football growing up with Lucas Lenhoff and remembered how Lucas’ parents had told him if he ever needed anything to call them.
“It’s been better,” he said of living with the Lenhoffs. “I don’t have to worry about a lot of things and at home, I had to do a lot on my own. I didn’t have anybody to help me and they help me a lot.”
The other young man, from Long Beach, lived with his grandmother until she died of cancer when he was 18, he said. He’s known “Miss Carla and Steve” since he was younger and decided to come to Charlotte with them.
Carla Lenhoff, he said, “is a real positive person and genuine.”
The Trouble Begins
The Lenhoffs acknowledge they brought 11 football players with them from three states and identified the addresses of where they are living. They detailed much of their decision to move to Charlotte with several other families in a story in The Observer last fall.
That didn’t stop it from becoming a topic of gossip within high school circles, particularly when several top Myers Park players left the school.
Two starters went to Hough, two more went to Providence Day and Cox Mill. Other players who were on track to start, according to their parents who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said like they were pushed back for the California kids, and that the Lenhoffs had some influence on the Myers Park coaches.
Recently departed Mustangs football coach Curtis Fuller did not return several phone calls from The Observer. Carla Lenhoff vehemently denied that charge, saying her kids simply compete for playing time like anyone else. By the end of the fall 2021 season, Steven Lenhoff estimated that seven of the 11 out-of-state players were starting for the Mustangs.
One former Myers Park parent did talk to The Observer on the record.
Tim Newman is the father of former Mustangs running back Jacob Newman. His daughter, Desiree, was part of the Mustangs girls’ state basketball championship team eight years ago. His older son, Tim Jr., was a starting running back for the football team.
Jacob led the team in rushing during the spring 2021 season and had hoped for a big senior year last fall, but Tim Newman moved his family into the South Mecklenburg district before the fall season began. A preseason all-state selection, Jacob Newman went on to be a finalist for the N.C. Mr. Football Award and was named SoMECK Player of the Year, the same conference that Myers Park plays in.
“They didn’t want my son to be the face of the program,” Tim Newman said. “They wanted Lucas Lenhoff to be the face of the program, and they started treating my son really bad. They took the ball out of his hands.”
Newman said in a playoff game in the spring that Lenhoff threw for six touchdowns in a blowout win, but Jacob Newman got one carry — that he turned into a 79-yard scoring run.
“They mistreated my son and I had to get him out of there,” Tim Newman said. “I knew something fishy was going on. I think the Lenhoffs were in full control of the football program with some other people over there as well. The minute (that longtime Mustangs football coach Scott) Chadwick left (a week before the spring 2021 season began), the Lenhoffs got in charge and other people in the Myers Park organization got in charge.
“I think it’s a sad situation. My kid made an impact in ninth grade and wanted to finish there and they were more loyal to those (new) kids than others in the community.”
The Observer asked Newman if he felt the Lenhoffs had done anything to lead Myers Park to get into the eligibility trouble it faced.
“I can’t say what happened,” he said. “I just feel bad for the kids who did not do anything wrong. I feel bad for those kids and for the Myers Park community because they deserve a great, winning football team. I don’t know what they did, but that’s a great school, one of the finest schools around. (Principal) Folk is one of the best principals in the country. Jacob went to (Alexander Graham Middle School, where Folk worked before coming to Myers Park). Dr. Folk was good to the kids and I think he’s a great man. I know it was tough for him to do what he did, but he’s a man of character.”
The Investigation
Carla Lenhoff thinks she knows how the investigation into Myers Park began.
She said one of the parents whose child was living with them was the one who went to the Myers Park principal with the tip about the ineligible players. That parent was from out of state but not from California. The Lenhoffs would not provide her name.
The student was scheduled to graduate in December, according to the Lenhoffs, but the mother wanted to have him intentionally be one class short so he could stay with the Lenhoffs in Charlotte for another semester. After they declined, they said that’s when the mother went to the Myers Park principal.
“She was trying to extort us,” Carla Lenhoff said. “When she came to town, she was supposed to help out with her child. Instead, she was too grand to do that and I had to go put her up at (a) hotel. So she would take her son out to dinner and then she would go back to the hotel instead of helping out.”
When the investigation began, the Lenhoffs said no one from the N.C. High School Athletic Association or Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools called them.
“No one ever talked to us,” Steven Lenhoff said. “Everything that should’ve been done on our end was done. We said these are the rules. The kids all lived in the district and this was to be their residence. That was the intention. The parents couldn’t get places. If they could get places, we wouldn’t have to do this. These kids are in horrible situations. We went through and made sure everyone was in the district. We told all the parents, ‘You had to do your paperwork. Everything had to be right.’ ”
Yellow Flags and Red Flags
Tucker, NCHSAA commissioner, said there “were more than three kids” with fake documents in the Myers Park investigation and that some were in-state and some out of state. She said that it didn’t take long after seeing the documents that were some inaccuracies and what she called “yellow flags.”
“We talked about the out-of-state students,” she said, “but we also talked about some students that they believe also lived in state and were CMS students as well. It was a combination of things. When you looked at the whole body of information shared with me, coupled with my discussions and questions I asked, the information was available to determine that we need to do more digging here before we let these students dress out.”
Tucker said that because some of the students were also enrolled in the spring, it’s likely that some were also ineligible for that football season as well, but that the NCHSAA’s statute of limitations doesn’t allow it to retroactively penalize Myers Park for those infractions.
Tucker said it’s rare to have a school have these types of eligibility issues that likely stretch across two seasons.
“It typically doesn’t rise to this level,” she said, “because schools have all the things in place that those yellow flags would’ve been waving and those red flags would’ve been waving and before we got to this point, they would have been able to determine that, ‘Oh, we have a problem.’ ”
She praised Myers Park principal Folk for his quick work in this case, identifying the problem just two weeks into his new job and correcting it.
“I thank him for being a man of integrity,” Tucker said, “and not sweeping this under the rug and saying, ‘Football season’s over.’
“It’s been a long time since we’ve had one that has risen to this level,” Tucker said, “and I don’t know why this happened the way it did. That’s unfortunate. My job now is to try to make sure other schools have checkpoints in place and are doing their due diligence and try to ensure that Myers Park is able to move forward. Yes, let’s look back at what went wrong but move forward understanding we’re not going to repeat those mistakes.”
‘The most disappointing part’
The Lenhoffs don’t think they’re to blame for Myers Park getting in trouble.
“I have no idea what happened at Myers Park because all my kids live in the district,” Carla Lenhoff said.
Two of the students who originally came with them are now back in California. One had major ankle surgery and is recovering. One may get a shot at playing for a small college out west.
“We’re just trying to help kids in unusual situations,” Steven Lenhoff said. “We had three houses to make sure everyone had a house, a bed. You’re dealing with people that are not from typical households and ... these kids we’re responsible for, end of the day, we had to be because if not they were going to end up on the street.”
Carla Lenhoff imagined a different ending, too.
“What happened with all the kids is the most disappointing part of this,” she said, “because I feel like I failed. I would’ve loved to watch all of them graduate together. It’s disappointing and this is not about football, and I think people don’t get that.
“These kids have been together for a long time.”
This story was originally published April 1, 2022 at 3:05 PM.
