We’re knee-deep in post-season basketball now with the first of three state tournaments being played in Yakima right now. Next week, with more local teams playing we will be hip deep and the week after, who knows?
I love the state tournaments. Sure, they’re a lot of work but there is incredible intensity on and off the court. This is when it counts for the kids and that makes for great photos. Obviously, there’s great game action to be photographed but off the court, a number of stories emerge as each tournament progresses.
One such story is that of the Neah Bay girls’ basketball team.
Members of the Neah Bay High School girls basketball team gather for a pre-game prayer on Feb. 26, 2009 at the state class 1B basketball tournament in Yakima. The team memorialized the grandfather of one of the team members (who was also the father of an assistant coach) with writing on their arms. "Gramps," Leonard Denney, died as the team travelled to the basketball tournament in Yakima on Feb. 24.
The assistant coach, who also served as the bus driver, returned home to Neah Bay (something like an 8-hour journey, at the far northwestern end of the state) and a replacement driver was sent to Yakima. Just a little nugget from the tournament which won’t make headlines but is still interesting.
The tournament organizers, bless ‘em, set up a media room with free food and drink. Maybe they do it to assure coverage since I’ve never seen a media member turn down free food. There’s at least one local media person who sometimes spends as much time eating as doing their job (we at the H-R know who that person is but he/she will not be named on this blog).
Food in the media room at the state class 1B basketball tournament in Yakima on Feb. 26, 2009.
We’re pretty choosy about food at the start of the tournament (on Wednesdays) but as each day goes on and we spend more time at the arena we are much less discriminating so even the pretzels and stale Costco muffins look good. There is one huge hole in this year’s media menu: the bucket o’ Red Vines that usually sits in the media room is not there this first week of tournaments. The lack of RV was first noticed by H-R photographer Kris Holland (but he says he doesn’t eat them).
More on the tournament as it goes along.
–Gordon King
