Only one of the Catalina High School boys basketball players had ever been on an airplane as of last week. So, during their Dec. 26 departure from Phoenix’s Sky Harbor International Airport to Chicago for a holiday tournament, senior Phillipe Kijana was understandably scared.
As the plane continued gaining altitude, Kijana kept turning around to look at his teammate Jose Lugo, who was just at scared, if not more, about his first plane ride. Kijana was eventually able to calm his nerves, but then the sense of fear came back when he thought about the landing.
“If anything, I was more scared, because I was ‘what if we go straight down,’” Kijana said.
But the plane didn’t crash — or go through any of the wild scenarios any of the players were concerned about — and the Trojans were able to play at the Charles A. Prosser Career Academy holiday basketball tournament.
The Trojans finished the tourney 1-3 and Lugo was named to the all-tournament team. They will continue the rest of their season Tuesday, when they host Pusch Ridge at 7:30 p.m.
But the trip to the Windy City was never just about playing basketball.
Before the start of the basketball season, when coach Obie Tann first thought up the idea, the Catalina boys team had only $47 in their account. Yet, somehow, Tann, along with assistant coach Chris Stallkamp, was able to plan the trip to his hometown to introduce his athletes to Chicago basketball.
The coaches also received help from the Catalina High School Foundation and from kind strangers.
“Our foundation helped greatly with, not only financing, but finding donors,” Tann said.
After Tann had to make some last-minute changes to trip arrangements to include another assistant coach and a student photographer, Tann booked an Airbnb close to have sleeping arrangements for everyone.
Alonso Zaragoza, the owner of the house Tann stayed at, coincidentally, graduated from the same school as the Catalina coach (albeit, four years earlier). Once Tann told him why the team was in town, Zaragoza, who is part of Belmont-Cragin United, a local community organization, created a GoFundMe to help raise money to help provide better meals for the team.
“They raised some money and he went half with me on a couple of dinners that were very expensive,” Tann said. “He also arranged for us to get a discount at the John Hancock Building.”
The team was able to go up to the 94th floor of the John Hancock building and to the 360-degree experience.
Tann also took the players to Loyola Park, where he grew up playing basketball, and Michael Jordan’s workout facility — Station 23.
Senior Erik Valdez said his parents were excited for his son to be able to take part in such a big trip.
“They thought it was great to go out, explore, be with my team somewhere else and see different kinds of athletes,” Valdez said.
Because of the amount of work needed to make a trip of this size happen — the planning, fundraising and organizing – Stallkamp believes schools don’t try putting together a trip of this magnitude.
“Not a lot of schools do this because it takes a lot of time, it takes a lot of money, you dedicate a lot of your personal time to raising money and getting everything prepared,” Stallkamp said.
“The logistics of everything was the toughest part — figuring out how to get the kids everywhere they need to be through Chicago traffic. But it was a great experience, so it was well worth all that stuff.”
This is Tann’s and Stallkamp’s third and final season with the Trojans. Tann will move to Phoenix with his family and Stallkamp has another job lined up.
So, the trip to Chicago served, in a way, as a going away present for the seniors and coaches.
“To do what we’ve done was way more than basketball,” Tann said. “It has always been ‘put (the students) first.’ People don’t get that.
“Yes, basketball is my background. It’s my career. But my passion is youth development.”
