Be Elite Basketball huge success

Posted Date: 05/13/2024

The Parks and Recreation Commission met this week and heard an update on the baseball fields from Parks and Recreation Director Chuck Eddington.

“The materials are here to install the additional netting to protect a home from stray baseballs. We will install that as soon as the big tournaments are over. We appreciate the homeowner’s patience,” Eddington said.

Membership fees for Creekside and teams participating in leagues were discussed at length. “We don’t make any money on our league fees. We just need to cover our costs,” Eddington said. 

Todd Curry with Be Elite Basketball reported on the past week’s activities. “We had three days of basketball with 71 teams and 900 families. We had to turn away some interested teams because of the lack of gym space. But we won’t have that problem next year,” He said. Curry reported that 33 teams stayed overnight, taking approximately 250-280 hotel rooms.

“Everything went very smoothly.” 

Curry told the commissioners what it took to put on a tournament like this. “We had 67 workers with 225 games in two and a half days. The teams were from Mississippi, Kansas, Louisiana, Tennessee, Oklahoma, Missouri and Arkansas. Each team brought 12-14 students with an average of five coaches each.”

Baseball and softball also happened last weekend at the Equity Bank Sports Complex. Eddington said, “We had 30 teams and were the only site with no rain delays in the regional tournaments. We have an excellent staff and great turf that made that possible. The Arkansas Activities Association was teasing us that we must have started our tournaments a day early. But we didn’t. Thanks to our citizens who voted for the upgrades, we just have great facilities. The AAA likes the way we run tournaments. We take very good care of the referees and umpires. When the only complaints are the calls the umpires make – that’s good.”