Then & Now: Hoopfest with Jeff Miller

Maybe it isn’t the knees that go first. Jeff Miller, former Cheney High star and Eastern Washington Eagle, is lacing up the sneaks for his 19th Hoopfest, but when pressed on the subject he couldn’t remember the best team name he and Clay Henry had come up with over the years.

“Clay comes over some afternoon in March and we think up a name,” said Miller, who just completed his 19th year as the East Valley principal.

The team name, changed annually, usually reflects the news of the day, which just begs for elaboration.

It took a second call to get Miller’s favorite from the 10th tournament: PerfectA10dance.

That’s way more interesting than 19th Hoopfest.

“I have to get myself through this one and next year,” said Miller, one of 66 hard-core hoopsters with perfect attendance. “My goal is to play 20 years, have 20 t-shirts, then maybe give back by being a court monitor.”

Having played in every Hoopfest, he’ll be prepared for the downside, which is “parents whose egos are channeled through kids.”

Miller, 52, can be forgiven after so many names and so many games. The casual attitude reflects the way Miller and Henry approach aging by sweating on the streets of downtown Spokane on the last weekend of June every year.

“It’s an annual rite of passage,” Miller said. “We used to be competitive, now we play for the fun of it.”

That is evident by the way they practice and prepare.

“Not at all,” Miller said. “We go down, throw on the shoes, flip the coin and go at it. Whatever happens, happens.

“It’s getting harder and harder to train. It’s down to I only play at Hoopfest. I have to discipline myself, Memorial Day is my day to start running.”

The world’s largest three-on-three outdoor basketball tournament was a natural progression for the 6-foot-8 Miller, an All-Frontier League player at Cheney who played under Jerry Krause at EWU.

“I continued to play when I was a teacher and coach,” Miller said. “When Hoopfest came around we finally gave up running Bloomsday in our basketball shoes.”

Hoopfest appeared just after Miller’s first year as principal at East Valley (he is now the longest tenured principal in Spokane County) but he reached out to his rec league teammates from his previous job, K-12 principal at Harrington, for the initial team: Earth Wind Fire and Rain (as in raining 3-pointers).

Henry and Brett Kiefer were teaching at Harrington, Jim Wacker was a basketball coach at a rival Bi-County school but only Henry remains.

“Brett started playing with his brother; Wacker just sort of disappeared,” Miller said.

Henry, now a principal at Goldendale, his brother John from the Tri-Cities, and Ed Shields, girls basketball coach at Sprague-Harrington, have made up the team in recent years.

“I was surprised how big the first one really was,” Miller said. “Spokane is the biggest little city in the world the way we support things … it’s just the right sized community. When it’s Hoopfest weekend it is THE event.”

Bigger cities may have outdoor tournaments but don’t shut down when invaded by asphalt roundballers, he noted.

“Spokane is just the right size to get it rallied around whatever it is,” Miller continued, referencing Bloomsday. “We’re kind of a single-event city and we have a great place to do it, downtown with that nice (Riverfront) park. The streets are pretty level, except for the ruts. That’s the biggest challenge of playing. It’s not a dribbler’s game, it’s a passer’s game.”

Miller and Henry have their share of success.

“We won it two or three times and in the championship game sometimes,” Miller said. “We always do pretty well. I think one time we didn’t make it to Sunday.

“The first game we played, the adult brackets had so few teams, I think we played against two guys and a girl. There wasn’t a lot of competition. I don’t think there was an elite bracket then. It’s changed. In fact it’s gotten to be a lot more competitive in the adult brackets as we got through our 30s and into our 40s.”

These day’s it’s more of a reunion.

“We see the same people. Steve Stockton has been in all of them and I think he’s in our bracket every time. I see people I used to coach, people from my schools,” said Miller, who started at Hunters as an assistant to Roy Graffis. “Now I see their kids.

“It’s just fun. You see everyone in the great northwest basketball world. It’s a great social event that gets bigger and bigger.”