Basketball players brave the heat for Summer Slam 3-on-3 tournament
As thermometers approached the 90-degree mark Saturday in Silverdale, the action at the Summer Slam 3-on-3 basketball tournament at Newlife Church's training and events center continued to pick up steam.
Games lasting 20 minutes apiece tipped off shortly after 9 o'clock in the morning on portable basketball hoops spaced out to form mini-courts in the parking lot. The action wrapped up in the early afternoon — before the blacktop began to seriously cook.
Despite the challenge of competing in abnormally high temperatures, most players didn't seem too fazed by the abundance of sun and extra sweat.
"Kids just want to play at the end of the day," said Sports Beyond program director Josh Mathews, whose organization sponsored the four-hour outdoor event.
There's history when it comes to outdoor basketball competitions in Silverdale. In the 1990s, Sports Beyond started sponsoring an annual 3-on-3 tournament during Whaling Days in late July at various sites, including at the Kitsap Mall. The Silverdale Beach Hotel hosted the Silverdale Shootout for several years beginning in 2007.
Mathews said he organized some smaller 3-on-3 events during his time as an assistant boys coach at Bremerton High School from 2014-18. Now that he's taken the torch from Sports Beyond chief executive officer Rick Walker as the organization's point man for programs and events, Mathews wanted to put 3-on-3 back on the schedule during this summer's Whaling Days weekend.
"It's great for the community," said former Central Kitsap basketball standout RJ Secrest, who helped coach a team of rising fourth-graders with former Bremerton basketball coach/athletic director Casey Lindberg. Secrest recently graduated from Western Washington University, where he played for the Vikings.
Nearly 40 teams signed up for Saturday's gathering, which featured brackets for youth players (3rd-12th grade) and had separate divisions for men and women.
"I was pretty confident we could at least get 30 teams for the first year," Mathews said.
Klahowya Secondary School girls basketball coach Chris Koebelin said Saturday's event afforded players from Kitsap County a rare opportunity to play outdoors. He noted there aren't many outdoor courts in Kitsap County.
"When I grew up ... we were outdoor for everything," said Koebelin, who served as a court monitor on Saturday. "We were playing outside everywhere and we played threes."
Fewer players on the court, Koebelin points out, means more opportunities for everyone involved.
"You are getting touches, you are getting more shots. It's more fluid," Koebelin said. "It's fun because all ages can play."
"As a coach, I think it makes kids a lot better," Mathews said. "Quite simply, I think it's just fun. People just want to play basketball against their friends, compete a little bit."
One team in the women's division featured Koebelin's daughter, Ella, the Kitsap Sun girls basketball player of the year for 2022, and Char Katz. Both Klahowya graduates are headed into college programs later this summer: Koebelin to Linfield University and Katz to Northwest University. Another member of the team was Violet Kapri Morrow, a former member of the Eastern Washington University women's program who now plays professionally in Iceland.
The Koebelin-Katz-Morrow combo team knocked off a squad representing Olympic College in one of the first matchups of the day.
This article originally appeared on Kitsap Sun: Basketball players brave heat for Summer Slam 3-on-3 tournament
