'Hoops and Partners' charity basketball game raising money for Tulsa organizations

"Hoops and Partners," a basketball charity game, will be raising funds for The Zone Academy and the Tulsa Dream Center.

The game, scheduled for Aug. 14 at Tulsa University's Reynolds Center, features former University of Oklahoma and current Golden State Warriors player Buddy Hield as a collaborator.

Joining the Coca-Cola Southwest Beverages Porch on Wednesday to share more about the upcoming event is Zone Academy Executive Director Kujanga Jackson and Kyron Stokes the Early Career Consultant at Williams.  

Q: Kyron, how excited are you to be involved? You played ball. What does this mean to you to be involved in something like this? 

Stokes: I was approached a couple of months ago on an idea, and then that idea sparked this entire event, which has been pretty amazing to bring in former Division I players, professional athletes. Anytime you can get a chance to play and get up and down with some really good people for a great cause, that's always exciting.

 Q: What does the Zone Academy do, and how do you help kids? 

Jackson: The zone has existed for 19 years, and what we do is we have a child development center for students who are pre-K through 5th grade. We do future-proofing and workforce development skills for junior high through high school students. We're trying to get them ready for the workforce of tomorrow.

Q: What does it mean to have Buddy Hield, an Oklahoma sports hero, involved in this?

Jackson: It's a huge thing because with all of the budget cuts and things that are affecting education, we really want to shine a light on the fact of what we can champion. We can champion our kids, and he stepped in, and we want to make sure that the kids who are doing programming after school and getting these skills, that they're heard, and we can have a good time and a fun time doing it.

Q: Buddy Hield will not be playing, will you be?

Both: Correct, Buddy will not be playing, but we will be.

Q: Tell me about some of your teammates who you're going to be playing with.

Stokes: There are some former [Tulsa University] players, TU legend Taleya Mayberry. She's gonna be playing another women's basketball player, Lakota Beatty, who also played at Oral Roberts. We have, I think, Obi [Emagano], he has been a professional, he played at Oral Roberts as well. He might be coaching, but a good group of people coming together and having a good time. 

Q: Any text chains, any trash talk?

Jackson: That's gonna start. I was gonna say that's going to start on social media here pretty soon.

Q: How do people get involved? How do you get tickets? How do people get there right?

Jackson: Right now, one of the big things is that we need sponsorships. We want to sponsor kids to better come out as school is coming back in, so people can go to touchtulsa.org to get tickets there, they can go buy tickets at the TU website.