Longtime Hoopfest players react to event cancellation

There was a void felt on the streets of downtown Spokane in late June, extending throughout the rural Inland Northwest.

Lilac City avenues weren’t marked with 3-point arcs. Parking lots weren’t engulfed with jersey-wearing patrons and vendors.

There were no echoes of dribbling basketballs, no music blasting from speakers and no crowd-roaring spectacles coming from Nike Center Court.

Hoopfest – the largest 3-on-3 basketball tournament in the world – was postponed to late August in hopes that coronavirus infections would flatten in time for the 31st edition of Spokane’s signature event.

Cases in Spokane County spiked, though, ultimately leading the cancellation of a tournament that annually attracts over 6,000 teams and 250,000 people, with an economic boost of roughly $47 million.

Hoopfest had no choice but to concede to a pandemic that’s infected 3.7 million Americans this year.

Public health was the organization’s No. 1 priority, but it held out hope as long as it could.

“We were really working hard to keep up the positivity and optimism while being compliant with our current reality,” Hoopfest director Matt Santangelo said. “Then to have it ultimately taken away, we’re feeling it around the office right now.

“From teams, volunteers and sponsors, there’s a collective disappointment that Hoopfest isn’t happening in 2020.”

Longtime Hoopfest player Jon Heimbigner, 72, was among the disappointed.

Heimbigner said he spoke with Hoopfest officials last year about the prospect of starting a senior division if he could get at least eight teams of players 60 and older together.

He was able to get 13 teams with fellow senior players from Washington, Idaho, Oregon and Utah.

“You love Hoopfest for everything Hoopfest is, so it’s a bit of a downer,” Heimbigner said. “A lot of us had worked to get in shape to play, so not to have the event is disappointing, but with everything going, on I understand why.”

Hoopfest legend JR Camel is no spring chicken, either, but on his recent 46th birthday, Camel put down a 360-degree dunk.

His team – Desert Horse – is an annual 6-foot-and-under elite division championship contender, comprised with Native American players who competed at the college level.

Camel, who starred at the University of Montana in the early 1990s, wishes he could make the annual drive from the Missoula area this year.

“Losing Hoopfest this year is a big thing, but health is a bigger issue,” Camel said. “I’d rather be safe than sorry. At Hoopfest, you’re better safe than sorry, especially with all those people from all over the country, shoulder to shoulder, in downtown Spokane.”

Former Gonzaga Prep and Eastern Washington guard Parker Kelly was aiming for another elite open championship. His team – Lee & Hayes - of former EWU standout Marc Axton, former Gonzaga forward Mike Hart and former Northwest Nazarene Robert Lippman, looked to win a fourth straight title.

Kelly, who helped EWU reach the NCAA Tournament in 2015, already misses Hoopfest.

“There’s definitely that huge void in the summer. I feel bad for the entire city of Spokane, especially all the small businesses,” Kelly said. “We were looking forward to that shot in the arm and rejuvenating the economy.”

If Hoopfest wasn’t canceled, it would have been dramatically altered.

Hoopfest held entrees at 50% capacity to limit the amount of people in downtown Spokane during a pandemic.

“We take such great pride in winning Hoopfest, because it brings out the best in the area and the best players,” Kelly said. “Anything different than the past wouldn’t have had the same feeling.”