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ELKINS -- For a third consecutive year, members of the Randolph County Sheriff's Office have been lacing up their sneakers and playing basketball games with students from different schools in the county.
Randolph County Prevention Resource Officers Rocky Hebb, Daniel Pennington and Ethan Carr schedule and run all of the basketball games for the RCSO. Each of the PRO officers are stationed at schools in the county.
"This is our third year of doing these games against the Randolph County students and it has become a great way to build rapport with them," Hebb told The Inter-Mountain. "We really enjoy going out and playing these games with the kids"
Last week a squad made up of the PRO officers and other law enforcement personnel from Randolph County traveled to Harman to face a group of high school and middle school students.
After a close first half, the students rallied in the second stanza to pull past the officers. During the halftime break of the contest, students wore DUI-simulating goggles and navigated a course on a foot pedal bike.
Those who volunteered for the halftime activity were rewarded with deputy trading cards and other prizes.
Also during halftime, a round of musical chairs played as the officers squared off against elementary, middle and high school students.
"Our trip to Harman was great, we loved it, the staff loved it, and all of the students there had a lot of fun," Hebb said. "Everybody involved had a great time and we look forward to going back over there next year."
The deputies played their second game of the year against students from Tygarts Valley High School and Pickens School at TVHS. The officers were joined by several staff members from TVHS and were able to squeak out a win.
"It was an awesome day at Tygarts Valley," Hebb said. "We played some games at halftime with the kids and gave prizes away to the winners. We also threw some little basketballs out to the crowd and gave away little bats. It was a really fun day."
The officers will play one more contest against students this year when they visit Elkins Middle School.
"We want to continue playing these games next year. We want it to become a tradition, an annual thing that we do," Hebb said. "The schools look forward to us doing it and the kids start asking about when we are going to play them at the beginning of the school year."