LEXINGTON, Ky. (LEX 18) — Last December, we told you about the Kentucky native coaching and bringing awareness to the Deaflympic Games happening in Tokyo. With those games less than a month away, Coach David Hamilton shares how the team has been working to prepare for the games.
Hamilton played five years himself, and this is his second year coaching. Hamilton was just 17 years old when he was first selected to represent Team USA on the Deaflympics basketball team.
“I was the youngest high school participant on the team, and I had never had an experience outside of the country,” Hamilton shared.
As coach of the team now, Hamilton added that practicing together with the entire team has been difficult. Because of players spread throughout the country, the team has had just a handful of practices all together as a unit.
“Everyone has different skills and different talents, and we just have to get together as a team,” he mentioned. “The key is the chemistry, and as a coach, I have to really know what their roles are.”
Despite the limited practice, members of Hamilton’s team did get to scrimmage against a team from Puerto Rico. A few players also had the chance to play against WNBA players from the Los Angeles Sparks.
“We had people that live in the LA area,” Hamilton recalled. “There's 4 or 5 players, so they were able to scrimmage for that first time and that was a lot of fun.”
“One of the players of the team, their parents are deaf, and so they do know how to sign as well.”
Leading up to the trip, the players were able to fundraise $7,200 dollars for themselves to go to Tokyo. However, David shared that the team is still looking for donations to help cover costs for food and transportation once they get to Japan.
“Overall, we're really happy to go and represent the USA. We're not going to give up. We're going to do our job. We're going to collect and get those funds raised.”
Hamilton’s Deaflympics basketball team will have a few more practices together in Los Angeles before they leave for Tokyo on Nov. 10. The team’s first game is against Canada on Nov. 17.
You can find the schedule for Team USA here. You can also donate through a GoFundMe set up by Hamilton.
