Latest news with #Hoopfest
Yahoo
3 days ago
- Sport
- Yahoo
Paige Bueckers' Former Teammate Sends Message After Career Move
Paige Bueckers' Former Teammate Sends Message After Career Move originally appeared on Athlon Sports. After winning the women's NCAA championship with Paige Bueckers at UConn roughly two months ago, Kaitlyn Chen dreamed of making it as a player in the WNBA. Advertisement She was taken with the No. 30 overall pick in the third round of April's draft by the expansion Golden State Valkyries, but she was cut on May 14 just prior to the start of the regular season. But her dream of playing pro basketball isn't necessarily over. Chen announced on X on Tuesday that she has joined 3XBA, a three-on-three women's FIBA pro basketball league that also focuses on the development of its players. She let it be known that she will be taking part in Spokane Hoopfest as part of 3XBA later this month. "Hey Hoopfest fans, this is Kaitlyn," she said. "I can't wait for 3XBA Spokane." Chen grew up in the greater Los Angeles area, where she became the all-time leader in points, assists and rebounds at Flintridge Preparatory School. As a junior and senior, she was named the All-Area Player of the Year by Pasadena Star-News, a local media outlet in the San Gabriel Valley section of the Southland. Advertisement She spent her first three seasons of college basketball at Princeton before transferring to UConn for the 2024-25 season. The 5-foot-9 guard was named the Ivy League Player of the Year in 2023 as a sophomore, when she averaged 16.2 points per game. Connecticut Huskies guard Kaitlyn Chen (20) holds up a piece of the net after the national championship of the women's 2025 NCAA tournament against the South Carolina Gamecocks at Amalie Arena. Mandatory Credit: Kirby Lee-Imagn ImagesKirby Lee-Imagn Images With the Huskies, her offensive role diminished a bit, but she averaged 6.9 points and 3.4 assists a game and made 51.4% of her field-goal attempts. Chen became the first Taiwanese woman to win an NCAA championship, and just weeks later, she was the first to be drafted into the WNBA and play in a WNBA preseason game. Related: Indiana Fever Had Words After Snapping Three-Game Losing Streak This story was originally reported by Athlon Sports on Jun 4, 2025, where it first appeared.
Yahoo
31-05-2025
- Lifestyle
- Yahoo
Community hits the court for Hoopfest at Proctor Recreation Center
PEORIA, Ill. (WMBD) — Basketball and community spirit were on full display this weekend at the Proctor Recreation Center during the Peoria Park District's Streets Belong to Me: Hoopfest. The event was a high-energy 3-on-3 basketball tournament celebrating competition, connection and neighborhood pride. Jalen Jenkins, Program Director at Proctor Recreation Center, reflected on the deeper meaning behind the event. 'When I was a kid, I used to always play outside,' said Jenkins. 'But I feel like now that time is going on, we're all on our phones and social media stuff, so doing stuff like this just reminds all of us that we did come from being outside and playing with friends. It just reminded us to be a kid.' From 10 a.m. to 1 p.m., Saturday, local teams battled it out in friendly but fierce matchups for the chance to be crowned Kings and Queens of the Court. The tournament drew families, fans, and players of all ages, transforming the recreation center into a vibrant hub of athleticism and unity. The festivities kicked off Friday night with the Streets Belong to Me celebration — an evening full of swimming, food, music, and fun that brought the community together beyond the court. Beyond the games and festivities, the event served a greater purpose — creating safe, welcoming spaces for youth to gather, play, and connect. '[The purpose was] to really connect the communities and get all the kids outside, just to know that this is a safe space for them to play and to come and visit,' Jenkins added. Organizers say Hoopfest was about more than just basketball — it was a celebration of community, belonging, and the importance of outdoor recreation in kids' lives. With strong turnout and enthusiastic participation, the event was a clear slam dunk. Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Yahoo
17-05-2025
- Sport
- Yahoo
Four-Star Center Sam Funches Reveals Tentative Dates for Official Visit to Gonzaga
Sam Funches, among the top ranked centers in the 2026 recruiting class, is working on rescheduling his official visit to Gonzaga and told Athlon Sports he has two weekends in mind. Funches, who is ranked No. 41 overall in the 247Sports composite 2026 class rankings, said he is looking at June 27-29 or the weekend of Kraziness in the Kennel - which has not been formally scheduled yet but will likely take place on October 4. Advertisement He also confirmed his previously planned official visit to Gonzaga, which was set to take place February 14-16, did not happen because his Germantown high school team was still participating in the state playoffs in Mississippi. Germantown defeated Madison Central to win the 7A championship, with Funches contributing 16 points and seven rebounds on 7-11 shooting. Funches has 23 total offers and has already taken official visits to Kansas, Ole Miss, and Cal and has plans to visit not only Gonzaga but Vanderbilt, LSU, and Mississippi State as well. Gonzaga, like most college programs, prefers to have high profile recruits on campus to see a game, but the two offseason weekends most likely to bring in recruits are Kraziness in the Kennel and the last weekend in June, when the streets of Spokane are converted into tens of thousands of basketball courts for Hoopfest, the largest three-on-three basketball tournament in the world. Advertisement Whichever weekend Funches ends up in Spokane will show just exactly why the city is nicknamed Hooptown, USA, and why Gonzaga fans are some of the best in the world. The big man also told Athlon he is now 7'0 and 220 pounds after being listed at 6'10 and 205 pounds by multiple recruiting services. Gonzaga has yet to land a commitment in the 2026 recruiting class, with Funches the only known offer made by the staff so far, although the program has been connected to No. 1 ranked recruit Tyran Stokes as well as small forward Dean Rueckert. Related: Top 2026 Recruit and Gonzaga Target Postpones Visit to Kentucky
Yahoo
20-03-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Jimmy Kimmel declares ‘Gonzaga isn't real' ahead of March Madness
This story was originally published on As Gonzaga University prepares for its 26th straight March Madness tournament, late-night talk show host Jimmy Kimmel used his platform to spread the word on one of his favorite conspiracy theories: Gonzaga isn't real. 'The files I want to see released have nothing to do with JFK. The files I want to see are related to a conspiracy theory that I've been following since 2019,' Kimmel said during his monologue. 'Involving an imaginary college that only seems to come to life at this time of the year, the widespread hoax known as Gonzaga University that is once again going to the NCAA college basketball tournament despite any shred of evidence that a school exists.' Kimmel has been spreading this conspiracy theory for years, believing the school was made up to bust brackets and win basketball games. 'They claim it's up in Spokane, Washington; I've seen no evidence of it,' Kimmel said. 'Go to Google. Search Gonzaga. All you'll get are basketball videos.' Beef between Gonzaga and Kimmel This has been part of a lengthy, friendly back-and-forth between Kimmel and the university. The school has responded on social media many times providing evidence that there is a real university, and it is not a front to win March Madness Jimmy Kimmel, Gonzaga Exists. Sincerely, Kurt Nolen, former contractor for @jimmykimmel and current Gonzaga videographer. #KimmelToTheKennel #GonzagaExists #MarchMadness cc: @JimmyKimmelLive — Gonzaga University (@GonzagaU) March 21, 2019 The organizers of Spokane's 3-on-3 Hoopfest basketball event have previously invited Kimmel for him to join, while social media accounts related to Spokane tourism continue to pester him over his claims. An online petition was even created to request that Kimmel serve as the university's commencement speaker. More than 1,200 people signed it. 'It's an imaginary school made it up to win basketball games,' Kimmel said. 'And they're all in on it.' Gonzaga has 46 victories in the NCAA 'March Madness' Tournament across 27 total appearances. The university has made the Sweet 16 round 14 times, including nine straight trips from 2015 to 2024 — when the beef with Kimmel started. Gonzaga also has six Elite Eight appearances and has twice appeared in the national championship game, losing both times. The Gonzaga Bulldogs lost 71–65 to North Carolina in 2017 and 86–70 to Baylor in 2021. Mark Few has been the head coach of Gonzaga men's basketball since 1999. Gonzaga faces off against Georgia in the first round of the tournament in a battle of the Bulldogs Thursday at 1:35 p.m.
Yahoo
06-02-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Mayor Lisa Brown waives higher costs to large event organizers in Spokane
Feb. 5—Large events being held in Spokane this year will no longer be expected to pay significantly raised prices to the city to cover the costs of police, fire and other services, after Mayor Lisa Brown issued an executive order pausing the cost increase. "Community events are the heartbeat of our city," Brown wrote in a Wednesday press release. "But we're seeing too many barriers that make hosting these events harder than it should be." Those costs to the city can peak in the hundreds of thousands of dollars for larger events, and the city currently only recovers around 12% of those costs through fees on event organizers capped well below costs, according to information provided by city officials Wednesday. For most events, those costs to organizers were set to double this year. For instance, organizers of Hoopfest, which is by far the most costly for the city to staff, were going to jump from $45,000 to $90,000 this year. In 2023, the city spent $80,000 just to cover overtime costs for Spokane police officers working that event, who are incentivized in the most recent guild contract with double pay for overtime to work major events in the city. Those significant overtime payments contributed to the police department's inability to control its budget in past years, with council members in 2023 specifically considering higher compensation from large event organizers as a strategy to cover ballooning overtime costs to the city. Other attempts to cover some of those costs have been the center of past local political debate. In 2023, then-Mayor Nadine Woodward recommended raiding the city's Traffic Calming Fund, typically used on street infrastructure, in part to help cover the city's costs for staffing these events. The city code that would have implemented the higher compensation costs for 2025 also allows the mayor to waive those costs, which the administration pointed to Wednesday as giving it the authority to prevent those costs from rising this year. Brown's executive order freezes costs to organizers at their 2024 level, while pledging to find ways to cut down the city's costs so the municipal budget doesn't eat the entirety of the roughly $91,000 in lost revenue from keeping costs the same. City spokeswoman Erin Hut suggested this could entail standardizing parade routes, replacing some police monitoring traffic with concrete barriers or other temporary infrastructure, or other strategies. Hut also described this move as an intermediary step while City Hall drafts longer term solutions and works out its cost saving measures. She added that it was necessary to make the change via executive order, rather than have the City Council legislate, because organizers for spring and summer events are already planning their budgets. Councilman Michael Cathcart, who had fought to keep the compensation costs for the organizers of the small Hillyard Hi-Jinx Parade to $400, noted that some organizers can struggle to pay for the city's costs. "We also face the risk that organizations like Hoopfest, with a big economic impact, might move to a lower cost jurisdiction, which has been explored by them in the past," Cathcart wrote in a text. Shortly after the mayor's announcement, the Spokane Lilac Festival Association praised the decision and noted their costs to operate the annual festival and parade had "risen at an unsustainable rate" in the last two decades. That organization would have had to pay the city $20,000, up from $10,000, if the price hike had been implemented. "By pausing the increase in event fees, this will allow SLFA leadership to plan strategically for funding needs and coordinate with Spokane's legacy events, which contribute to the local economy through hotel stays, sales tax, and support for jobs," the association wrote in a news release.
