Team Challenge ALS Falters Down the Stretch, Loses to Sideline Cancer
Andy Backstrom
Staff Writer
Before the start of the second quarter of The Basketball Tournament’s (TBT) Thursday afternoon bout between No. 6 Team Challenge ALS and No. 22 Sideline Cancer, ESPN listened in on Sideline Cancer head coach Charlie Parker’s message to his team—a group that, two days earlier, upset 11th-seeded Team Hines after overcoming a 12-point second-half deficit.
“Guys, I don’t think this team can guard us,” the former Millersville star said. “But we can’t fall in love with the outside game. … We gotta attack. They cannot defend us.”
Initially, it appeared as if that was false confidence on Parker’s part. Team Challenge ALS held Sideline Cancer to 40% shooting in the first half, while scoring 16 points off eight turnovers. But in the fourth quarter, Marcus Keene, Eric Thompson, Maurice Creek, and Remy Abell made their head coach look pretty darn good.
Sideline Cancer—the Cinderella team of TBT in 2019—outscored Team Challenge ALS, 24-9, in the final frame, using a 10-3 surge to run Team Challenge ALS out of Nationwide Arena and cap a 76-66 win during the Elam Ending. Abell, a Xavier grad, hit the game-winning 3-pointer, but Keene (16 points, six assists) was once again the architect of Sideline Cancer’s success.
For the second straight year, Sideline Cancer has won two TBT games. Team Challenge ALS, on the other hand, is already out of the competition after three consecutive deep tourney runs.
Team Challenge ALS was organized by Boston College men’s basketball alums Sean Marshall and Steve Hailey in 2016 to not only honor former BC baseball captain and ALS patient Pete Frates, but also raise awareness and funds for ALS research. It only took two years for the group to reach TBT’s championship, but Marshall, Hailey, and Co. fell just short of the title in 2017.
Frates died from ALS this past December, but the fight against the disease has continued in his name. Marshall, who still serves as both the general manager of and a small forward for Team Challenge ALS, wears the name of Frates—his college roommate—on the back of his jersey. Likewise, every other player on the team has a different name of an ALS patient battling the disease on their uniforms.
“Every year we try to come up with something new to reach more people and to show that we support more people out there fighting this disease that, in all honesty, doesn’t get as much support as some of the other diseases,” Marshall told ESPN sideline reporter Jennifer Hale before Thursday’s contest. “Just trying to play our part in the fight.”
Inspired by a different—yet equally tragic—disease, Sideline Cancer joined TBT with the same intentions: to spread awareness. Hence, the teams’ Thursday afternoon matchup was about more than just a shot at getting one step closer to the winner-take-all $1 million prize.
And it made for some pretty entertaining basketball, too.
The bubble in Columbus, Ohio—which has already required players and staff to pass five rounds of COVID-19 testing, per Hale—is void of artificial crowd noise. Throughout the two-hour game, viewers could hear players communicating on the court. It was the backdrop of ESPN’s socially-distanced broadcast. Weird, no doubt. But a spectacle to say the least.
Most of the game could be boiled down to a war between backcourt stars Keene and Tyrese Rice. Keene, a 5-foot-9 guard who led the nation in scoring (30.0 ppg) while playing for Central Michigan in 2016-17, piloted Sideline Cancer’s offense for the second game in a row. Meanwhile, Rice—who, like Marshall, was part of BC’s Sweet Sixteen team in 2005-06—made a splash in his TBT debut, using the dribble-drive to toy with Sideline Cancer’s interior defense.
Rice finished with a game-high 19 points and didn’t waste any time making his mark. The crafty guard logged eight points and five assists in the opening frame, including a behind-the-back dime to Deshawn Stephens in the early going and a kick-out pass to Stephens for a wide-open, buzzer-beating 3-pointer at the end of the first half.
Team Challenge ALS appeared to have Sideline Cancer’s number in the first half—and really over the course of the opening three quarters of play. After trading blows in the first frame, Team Challenge ALS stitched together a 13-3 run in the second period. Rice and Stephens’ dramatic sequence at the end of the half established a 40-33 lead heading into intermission.
Team Challenge ALS only coughed up the ball four times through the first two quarters of the contest, but its turnover count quickly escalated in the back half of the game. Rice’s scoring ability and Team Challenge ALS’ frontcourt presence was enough to counteract the erratic ball handling—for now, at least.
Rice swished back-to-back treys, and the power forward pairing of Stephens, who played at San Diego State, and Jordan Faison, a Cal Poly Pomona product, strung together baskets in the post.
Despite being overmatched in the paint, Sideline Cancer wasn’t without a prominent big man. In fact, 6-foot-9 center Eric Thompson was larger than life in the second half. The University of Pacific grad rounded out the day with 15 points and a game-high 13 rebounds. His physicality and a couple of Abell buckets late in the third quarter kept Sideline Cancer in the game.
Sideline Cancer turned the corner by shutting down Rice—one of the better closers in the ACC during his college days. Parker’s team limited Rice’s touches in the halfcourt set, often making the guard move without the ball to create a shot for himself. On the other end of the floor, Keene started to heat up, and not just in the scoring sense. To start the quarter, the shifty guard fed Thompson for an inside bucket and then, on the next possession, made the extra pass to Pittsburgh alum Jamel Artis for an open 3-pointer.
Keene took matters into his own hands, however, to break a 60-60 tie shortly thereafter. And from that point forward, Sideline Cancer didn’t let up.
The Elam Ending began with Team Challenge ALS trailing, 66-63, and the target score was set for 74. A self-made Maurice Creek 5-0 run set the stage for Abell (17 points) to finish the job. He first hit a pair of shots at the charity stripe and then knocked down the game-winning 3-pointer.
Sideline Cancer will now play No. 3 Boeheim’s Army (a team full of Syracuse men’s basketball alums) in the TBT quarterfinals on Saturday. Conversely, Marshall and Team Challenge ALS have been eliminated from TBT earlier than most expected. Still, basketball aside, Thursday’s matchup will be remembered for quite some time.
“You have two teams playing for something bigger than themselves,” Marshall said before the game. “Playing for something bigger than just basketball—and honoring people who are fighting two deadly diseases.”
Andy Backstrom
Staff Writer
Before the start of the second quarter of The Basketball Tournament’s (TBT) Thursday afternoon bout between No. 6 Team Challenge ALS and No. 22 Sideline Cancer, ESPN listened in on Sideline Cancer head coach Charlie Parker’s message to his team—a group that, two days earlier, upset 11th-seeded Team Hines after overcoming a 12-point second-half deficit.
“Guys, I don’t think this team can guard us,” the former Millersville star said. “But we can’t fall in love with the outside game. … We gotta attack. They cannot defend us.”
Initially, it appeared as if that was false confidence on Parker’s part. Team Challenge ALS held Sideline Cancer to 40% shooting in the first half, while scoring 16 points off eight turnovers. But in the fourth quarter, Marcus Keene, Eric Thompson, Maurice Creek, and Remy Abell made their head coach look pretty darn good.
Sideline Cancer—the Cinderella team of TBT in 2019—outscored Team Challenge ALS, 24-9, in the final frame, using a 10-3 surge to run Team Challenge ALS out of Nationwide Arena and cap a 76-66 win during the Elam Ending. Abell, a Xavier grad, hit the game-winning 3-pointer, but Keene (16 points, six assists) was once again the architect of Sideline Cancer’s success.
For the second straight year, Sideline Cancer has won two TBT games. Team Challenge ALS, on the other hand, is already out of the competition after three consecutive deep tourney runs.
Team Challenge ALS was organized by Boston College men’s basketball alums Sean Marshall and Steve Hailey in 2016 to not only honor former BC baseball captain and ALS patient Pete Frates, but also raise awareness and funds for ALS research. It only took two years for the group to reach TBT’s championship, but Marshall, Hailey, and Co. fell just short of the title in 2017.
Frates died from ALS this past December, but the fight against the disease has continued in his name. Marshall, who still serves as both the general manager of and a small forward for Team Challenge ALS, wears the name of Frates—his college roommate—on the back of his jersey. Likewise, every other player on the team has a different name of an ALS patient battling the disease on their uniforms.
“Every year we try to come up with something new to reach more people and to show that we support more people out there fighting this disease that, in all honesty, doesn’t get as much support as some of the other diseases,” Marshall told ESPN sideline reporter Jennifer Hale before Thursday’s contest. “Just trying to play our part in the fight.”
Inspired by a different—yet equally tragic—disease, Sideline Cancer joined TBT with the same intentions: to spread awareness. Hence, the teams’ Thursday afternoon matchup was about more than just a shot at getting one step closer to the winner-take-all $1 million prize.
And it made for some pretty entertaining basketball, too.
The bubble in Columbus, Ohio—which has already required players and staff to pass five rounds of COVID-19 testing, per Hale—is void of artificial crowd noise. Throughout the two-hour game, viewers could hear players communicating on the court. It was the backdrop of ESPN’s socially-distanced broadcast. Weird, no doubt. But a spectacle to say the least.
Most of the game could be boiled down to a war between backcourt stars Keene and Tyrese Rice. Keene, a 5-foot-9 guard who led the nation in scoring (30.0 ppg) while playing for Central Michigan in 2016-17, piloted Sideline Cancer’s offense for the second game in a row. Meanwhile, Rice—who, like Marshall, was part of BC’s Sweet Sixteen team in 2005-06—made a splash in his TBT debut, using the dribble-drive to toy with Sideline Cancer’s interior defense.
Rice finished with a game-high 19 points and didn’t waste any time making his mark. The crafty guard logged eight points and five assists in the opening frame, including a behind-the-back dime to Deshawn Stephens in the early going and a kick-out pass to Stephens for a wide-open, buzzer-beating 3-pointer at the end of the first half.
Team Challenge ALS appeared to have Sideline Cancer’s number in the first half—and really over the course of the opening three quarters of play. After trading blows in the first frame, Team Challenge ALS stitched together a 13-3 run in the second period. Rice and Stephens’ dramatic sequence at the end of the half established a 40-33 lead heading into intermission.
Team Challenge ALS only coughed up the ball four times through the first two quarters of the contest, but its turnover count quickly escalated in the back half of the game. Rice’s scoring ability and Team Challenge ALS’ frontcourt presence was enough to counteract the erratic ball handling—for now, at least.
Rice swished back-to-back treys, and the power forward pairing of Stephens, who played at San Diego State, and Jordan Faison, a Cal Poly Pomona product, strung together baskets in the post.
Despite being overmatched in the paint, Sideline Cancer wasn’t without a prominent big man. In fact, 6-foot-9 center Eric Thompson was larger than life in the second half. The University of Pacific grad rounded out the day with 15 points and a game-high 13 rebounds. His physicality and a couple of Abell buckets late in the third quarter kept Sideline Cancer in the game.
Sideline Cancer turned the corner by shutting down Rice—one of the better closers in the ACC during his college days. Parker’s team limited Rice’s touches in the halfcourt set, often making the guard move without the ball to create a shot for himself. On the other end of the floor, Keene started to heat up, and not just in the scoring sense. To start the quarter, the shifty guard fed Thompson for an inside bucket and then, on the next possession, made the extra pass to Pittsburgh alum Jamel Artis for an open 3-pointer.
Keene took matters into his own hands, however, to break a 60-60 tie shortly thereafter. And from that point forward, Sideline Cancer didn’t let up.
The Elam Ending began with Team Challenge ALS trailing, 66-63, and the target score was set for 74. A self-made Maurice Creek 5-0 run set the stage for Abell (17 points) to finish the job. He first hit a pair of shots at the charity stripe and then knocked down the game-winning 3-pointer.
Sideline Cancer will now play No. 3 Boeheim’s Army (a team full of Syracuse men’s basketball alums) in the TBT quarterfinals on Saturday. Conversely, Marshall and Team Challenge ALS have been eliminated from TBT earlier than most expected. Still, basketball aside, Thursday’s matchup will be remembered for quite some time.
“You have two teams playing for something bigger than themselves,” Marshall said before the game. “Playing for something bigger than just basketball—and honoring people who are fighting two deadly diseases.”
