With the scoreboard reading Apple Valley with 36 – Minnehaha Academy with 35 on Thursday evening, Tre Jones walked out of the locker room for the second half, a good thirty seconds before the rest of his team. Jones picked up a ball and as he strode over to the free throw line alone All I Do Is Win, by DJ Khaled began blasting over the Apple Valley High School speakers.
This was fitting for Jones who, now a senior, possesses a list of high school basketball accolades that fill up a full page in the Apple Valley basketball program. Most notably, Jones is a two-time state champion with a career 71-1 record in the South Suburban Conference. The Duke University-commit is the most dominant high school basketball player in the state of Minnesota since 1997.
That accolade, however, belongs to the state of Minnesota basketball emeritus, Khalid El-Amin.
El-Amin represents dominance in Minnesota — winning three consecutive state championships from 1995-1997 with Minneapolis North’s Polars – but perhaps more importantly, El-Amin put Minnesota on the national hoops map.
With respect to Kevin McHale (’76) and Jim Petersen (’80) who won the state of Minnesota’s Mr. Basketball award — an accolade to annually recognizes the “most excellent” basketball player in Minnesota — El-Amin (’97’s Mr. Basketball) spurred something more: Basketball popularity in Minnesota.
The State of Hockey monicker has always overshadowed the quality of hoops in Minnesota but El-Amin instigated an insurgency of sorts. He made Minnesota hoops can’t-miss action.
On Thursday evening, ESPN was on-site at Apple Valley High School to nationally broadcast Jones’ game and shine a light on Minnehaha Academy sophomore phenom, Jalen Suggs — nephew of Baltimore Ravens linebacker and Minneapolis native, Terrell Suggs.
The gym was packed.
Minnesota Timberwolves point guard and Tre’s older brother, Tyus Jones, was in attendance directly behind the Apple Valley bench to witness his brother drop 39 points.
Jones – Mr. Basketball, 2014 – was one-year-old when El-Amin won the award but, in part, owes the acclaim he received as prep star to the growing popularity of basketball El-Amin helped inspire in Minnesota.
El-Amin, of course, is not the sole motivator of basketball popularity in the 90s. To be fair, that credit goes to the real basketball emeritus and GOAT, Michael Jordan. While El-Amin was winning his third state championship in 1997, Jordan was on his way to winning his sixth NBA title.
Jordan was Khalid El-Amin on steroids (or “Mike’s Special Stuff”). He was more than great at basketball; he was a mogul of the basketball community. He made basketball more than popular; he made basketball popular culture.
On top of Jordan’s pre-existing sponsorships with Gatorade and Nike, in 1997, he starred — with Bugs Bunny — in the major motion picture Space Jam and there he built the bridge from athlete to entertainer.
Space Jam
In 2016, The Washington Post called Space Jam “the movie we never knew we needed.” Earning $230 million at the box office, Space Jam is far and away the most popular basketball movie of all-time. Perhaps more impressive, though, is Space Jam‘s staying power.
To this day, fully-grown adults can be seen wearing jerseys with “Space Jam” emblazoned on the front, contributing to over $1 billion in retail sales of Space Jam related product. Beyond Mike and Bugs, what gave the movie more staying power is the self-titled soundtrack and album, Space Jam Soundtrack.
Music has a way of doing that.
I Believe I Can Fly, by R. Kelly – has become synonymous with not only Space Jam but Jordan himself and thus serves a mission statement for hoop dreamers nationwide.
With only 390 roster spots available in the National Basketball Association, hoop dreams are definitively for the dreamer. If you are a high school senior playing basketball at your school, there is a .03 percent chance of ever being drafted to the NBA.
Playing basketball with a desire to move to the highest level requires a special kind of belief. Jordan – cut from his varsity team in high school – has a story that is conceptually a Bildungsroman in its own right. The greatest basketball player of all-time is an oddly semi-logical inspiration for those who dream of playing the game for a paycheck someday – like Jones and Suggs.
Shortly after Jones finished shooting free throws during the halftime break, DJ Khaled’s music faded out and the Apple Valley Eagles huddled up around their head coach Zach Goring. The next musical track sparked up and, if you’re following here, you won’t be surprised to learn that track was, in fact, R. Kelly.
If I just believe it, there’s nothing to it
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