White Plains discontinues popular basketball league, cancels championship after shooting
Officials from a Westchester city announced they discontinued a basketball league and canceled its championship following a dispute and shooting that left three people from The Bronx injured Thursday.
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Officials from a Westchester city announced they discontinued a basketball league and canceled its championship following a dispute and shooting that left three people from The Bronx injured Thursday.
Gardella Park was home to the Ferris World Ball League, but on Friday, White Plains officials announced that they are canceling a championship set for Sunday and also are discontinuing the league.
The decision shocked Jalen Hamilton, who worked at the league's tournament at Gardella Park on Thursday.
"Yeah, that's definitely surprising to me. I loved Ferris, man," Hamilton said.
An organizer from Ferris World Ball said the shooting left their community "heartbroken" and added that it was first time an incident of this nature has taken place.
City officials said they made this decision because the men's league has started to grow over the years and started attracting people from all over the region.
Officials said popularity started creating capacity issues at the park and for the neighborhood it serves.
"The traffic was an issue, you know, and Sunday nights, the music [was] until 10 p.m." said White Plains resident Brian Flynn. "Otherwise, you know, everybody's peaceful, we never had a single problem with anybody."
Flynn said he would like to see an alternative solution to ending the league, but city officials said they were already talking about discontinuing the league before the shooting took place.
