He hit the roof before he blew the roof off.
Jordan Hunter went viral on social media last week after the Grade 12 student made a trick basketball dunk off the ceiling of the Jasper Place High School gym.
Hunter said he was inspired to try it by his father, a J-P grad himself, during a dunk contest on Thursday at the west Edmonton school’s 42nd annual Reb Invitational tournament.
“He used to do that off-the-roof dunk,” Hunter, who plays for the school’s senior boys Rebels squad, told CTV News Edmonton on Monday. “He was my coach on the junior team two years ago, and after practices, he showed me that throw. He was like, ‘Yeah, I still got it. I still got the throw,’ then I was like, ‘Well, I could probably go do the dunk.’”
And he did. Videographer Anthony Ly captured the big moment, which came on his final attempt to pull it off before a packed Centre Gym. His footage went viral on social media sites such as Instagram and TikTok, and caught the attention of television sports networks such as TSN, which broadcast the clip, and ESPN.
Ly’s footage shows Hunter throwing a basketball at the ceiling, it bouncing off two rafters, down to the floor and off a net’s backboard, where Hunter leaped and slammed the ball through the net, followed by a rapturous roar from the packed gym.
“He got it on the perfect bounce,” Ly said. “It bounced down, hit (the floor) and then he dunked it in. Thank goodness I was recording that, because I didn’t even expect it to. I don’t think anybody expected him to actually get it in, but it actually did.”
Lauren Green, the coordinator of the Reb tourney and the school’s athletic director, said she’s seen all kinds of different dunks attempted in her 16 years on staff but that Hunter’s “was probably the most creative.”
“To pull it off at the buzzer in that moment was pretty amazing,” Green said. “It was really cool to see all our students go wild and everyone else go wild and support him.”
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With files from CTV News Edmonton’s Sasha Pietramala
