Basketball team of deaf students from Utah takes 2nd at regional championships

Basketball team of deaf students from Utah takes 2nd at regional championships

(Courtesy of Michelle Tanner)


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VANCOUVER, Wash. — A basketball team from the Utah Schools for the Deaf and Blind took second place at a regional championship Saturday at the Western States Basketball and Cheerleading Classic.

The USDB Eagles lost a close 40-38 contest to the Phoenix Day School for Deaf Roadrunners.

"The games that I watched were all nail-biters," said educational director Michelle Tanner, who attended the games. "Every one of them came down to within five points. Most of the games we won were just by three or four points. All of the games were real tight, real close, so it was a great tournament in that regard."

Students for the USDB team come from all over the state. The USDB provides services to any deaf student across Utah in a variety of formats. A lot of the team members are affiliated with the Jean Massieu School of the Deaf in Salt Lake City, but players also commute from Ogden and other cities.

The team practices Monday through Thursday, with the exception of the days it has games.

The team's greatest strength lies in its defense, Tanner said.

Basketball team of deaf students from Utah takes 2nd at regional championships
Photo: Courtesy of Michelle Tanner

"They're really good at keeping the other teams at bay and they're really tough," she said.

Outside of the tournament, the boys team competes at the JV level in the 1A Classification because it is a small team with only 10 players. Tanner said the Eagles have won most of their 21 games and hope to qualify to be a varsity team next year.

Six schools competed in the tournament with teams coming from Utah, Arizona, Oregon, Washington and Canada.

The USDB girls team also competed in the tournament for the first time in several years, but it didn't make it far in the tournament. The Lady Eagles, however, won the sportsmanship award.

Issic Prettypaint, a senior on the boys team, won a shooting competition against players from all of the teams.

Tanner wanted to encourage more students to consider joining the boys and girls teams.

"There are a lot of other deaf kids out there who don't realize that they can participate on this team," she said. "All that needs to happen is they need to be deaf — that's the only requirement. The more people we get to try out, the more competitive it would become and it would make it so we could compete at even higher levels."

There was a great atmosphere of friendship and camaraderie at the tournament, Tanner said. That attitude carries over into the regular season.

"Typically it's harder for our deaf students to compete as a teammate on a basketball team because of interpreting issues or communication issues, but on our team all of the kids can communicate with each other because they're deaf so there are no barriers there," she said.

Utah will host the Western States Basketball and Cheerleading Classic next year, so she said it would be great to have a strong showing of boys and girls on the USDB teams.

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Natalie Crofts

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