“We’ve played every year but this is the first year where we are in charge of the organisation,” Elzahdan told Sport360°.
“It went great. We had close to 100 teams shows up. We had a new division this year, the junior boys between ages eight and 11. We also had a record number of girls and women’s teams.
“Our goal was to hit 100 teams and we came very close to that and we had teams from literally every emirate. We also had tons and tons of fans and schools and families. It’s a really exciting event and people could come and watch for free, so we had a big audience showing up.
“Every single year the level of competition gets better and better. We get teams from Al Ain and from Fujairah that just come out of the blue and we think ‘where do they come from?’ They’re so good.”
From left to right: Thomas Jacob Fenn, Vysakl Alumyal, Sanoj Kusian Jain, Arnav Arun and Jibson Chalil.
Elzahdan says his academy has a mission to spread the passion for basketball and competition within the various communities of the UAE and that the Sharjah Streetball Challenge helps his team do that.
He added: “Our company was originally based in Chicago, and one of the reasons we moved to Dubai is to establish a basketball infrastructure.
“We grew up in an environment where basketball is available on every corner and we want to provide that for kids here in the UAE. To show how schools can play against each other and bring the community element of it. Tournaments like this help us do that.”
RESULTS:
Men’s A: 1st Slava 3, 2nd Seko Mantara
Men’s B: 1st Regulators, 2nd Team Ziddy
Women’s: 1st Tru Ballers, 2nd Sins
Boys <17: 1st Underdogs, 2nd Beasts
Girls <17: 1st 69ers 2nd B.O.B
Junior Boys: 1st All Stars
Mixed: 1st Crazy Cats, 2nd Loopers
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