Search Squad Excels At Basketball and Track & Field

Special Olympics at Search is on fire!

The first year of our Search Squad Special Olympics team has been a smashing success. In March the Search Squad Red team traveled to Illinois Wesleyan University to compete in the Special Olympics State Basketball tournament.

The team did an exceptional job and rose to the challenge by playing games in Division 6, which is three divisions higher than usual! The team performed amazingly well and took home a silver medal! Even better, two players, Curtis and Michael, received Good Sportsmanship Awards.

We were able to ask some of the Search Squad players about their experiences on the team:

• Henry: Being on the team is very challenging. I like that. I have learned a lot about the game and how to be a tough player.
• Curtis: Its fun and I like the coaches. I love playing basketball for Search.
• Michael: It’s very good. The team is high quality. I have learned how to shoot and dribble the ball and learned about teamwork.
• Sean: I get a sense of achievement and have a lot of fun. I learned basketball skills and how to play as a team. My favorite thing about travelling downstate was playing basketball and having my family come to support me.
• Jimmy: I like the coaches and the players.  I learned that I can do better than I think if I work hard.

This spring, the Search Squad has also been hard at work training for Track & Field. In May, our athletes competed in 53 events total and brought home 34 gold medals in the Track & Field Area Qualifier. An amazing 20 athletes went on to compete in the State games in Bloomington, IL in the first weekend in June. They performed extremely well and brought home 6 golds, 5 silvers and 7 bronze medals!

Congrats to our Search Squad athletes! A big thank you to our coaches – including Danni, Sharon & Mary Ann – and to everyone who supported our athletes on this journey!

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