On Saturday, Nov. 21, the Atlantic winter sports athletes greeted their fans with a slam dunk.

The evening began with a boys’ open practice, giving the public a chance to see how Coach Alan Jenkins directs his team.

Participants in girls’ and boys’ basketball, swimming, wrestling and winter cheerleading were then introduced.

Next the basketball teams held a 3-point contest. Garrett Franken, the winner from the boys’ team, faced off against Erin Olsen from the girls’ team. Franken won the competition.

The boys’ basketball team then drew cheers from the crowd with a dunk contest that had five contestants: Garrett Franken, Scott Leonard, Grant Podhajsky, Ryan Hawkins and Alec Hayes.

Hawkins and Franken tied with a perfect scores in the initial round.  After facing off in a tie-breaker, Hawkins was declared the winner.

After the dunk and 3-point contests, the faculty played a basketball game. There were two teams: The Black team consisted of Chris Hansen,Tina Franken, Jacey Hoegh, Rhonda Hawkins, Zach Christensen, Devin Hogue, Heather McKay and Paul Iekel; the White team consisted of Dan Vargason, Emma Walker,Marcus Upchurch, Matt Alexander, Paul Dudley, Paul McKay, and Taylor Williams.

The game leader in scoring was Devin Hogue of the Black team with 14 points and the game leader in points scored by the White team was Dan Vargason with 11 points.

After the game, Paul Dudley from the White team  said, “The competition was tough and that the Black team played a good game.” Dudley also commented on his own performance: “I could have played better, but I enjoyed playing in the faculty basketball game.”

English teacher Emma Walker had a few things to say about the game. She said, “I played a bad game, but I enjoyed playing and helping my team win.”

The final score of the faculty basketball game was Black team 52,White team 25.

There was no admission fee to the night’s events, but free-will donations were matched by Duke Aerial and then donated to Coaches Vs. Cancer.