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© St. Petersburg Times, published August 15, 2002
TAMPA -- King running back Raymond Neal, the county's second-leading rusher as a sophomore last season with 1,498 yards, is academically ineligible and will not play this season.
Neal needed to pass a summer school class to raise his grade point average to 2.0. He had to withdraw from the class after being arrested June 13 and began the fall semester with a 1.96 GPA.
Neal entered a plea of not guilty Aug. 6 to 13 counts of theft and auto burglary. He returns to court Sept. 17 for a disposition hearing.
Neal is charged with seven counts of burglary of a conveyance, four counts of petty theft and two counts of grand theft auto, third degree.
Neal also didn't play in the spring jamboree in May due to disciplinary problems.
King coach Joe Severino held out hope the 5-foot-10, 180-pound Neal would be able to return at some point after his hearing.
"(He could play) if he was in school and he was eligible, but he's not, so it doesn't matter now," Severino said. "The bottom line is that he made the choices to do these things. So hopefully now he'll make the right choices after he sees the consequences. That's just the school part. Legally, we don't know what's going to happen to him.
"He's still young and he needs to become more mature. But I'll say this, I've already seen an attitude change for the better from the end of the school year until now."