Demonstrators protested outside City Hall and disrupted the start of an NBA game in Sacramento, California, after police shot and killed an unarmed black man. Police say they feared Stephon Clark was holding a gun when they shot him on Sunday. AP
When the Sacramento Kings and Boston Celtics face off on Sunday afternoon at the Golden 1 Center, the NBA’s latest bigger-than-basketball moment will be on full display.
One week after two Sacramento police officers fired 20 shots and killed unarmed 22-year-old African-American Stephon Clark in South Sacramento after responding to a call about break-ins, and three days after hundreds of protesters blocked the entrance to a Kings-Hawks game, the Black Lives Matter conversation will continue in a variety of forms.
Kings players will wear pregame warm-up shirts that read “Accountability. We Are One.” on the front and “#StephonClark” on the back. While the Celtics were originally planning to wear the shirts as well, they ultimately elected not to. And at some point in the first quarter, as the many fans who faced closed doors on Thursday get settled in, a powerful public service announcement from Kings and Celtics players will play on the in-house video screen. Soon thereafter, it will be aired on the broadcast and online for the outside world to see.
USA TODAY Sports got an advanced look at the PSA ahead of Sunday's game in Sacramento.
“These tragedies have to stop,” Kings rookie De’Aaron Fox says at the start.
“There must be accountability,” Celtics big man Al Horford follows.
And so on from there. In all, it’s 62 poignant words spoken by 17 player voices – with one shared goal of raising awareness.
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The production process unofficially began on Thursday night, when Celtics coach Brad Stevens was among the many who were moved by Vivek Ranadive’s postgame speech. The Kings owner had stood at midcourt addressing the few thousand fans who made it in before the doors had been closed, expressing sympathy for Clark’s family and emphasizing the importance of a unified community. Stevens, who was with his team in Portland at the time, reached out.
“Brad Stevens was real big,” said Kings guard Garrett Temple, who was integral in the process as well. Temple, in particular, is adamant that police need to be held more accountable.
“Right away, right after (Stevens) heard Vivek, he wanted to do whatever he could, and with his organization he wanted to do whatever he could to help and be in support of us. To have seven or eight of those guys come over from the (team) hotel (in Sacramento) and do that PSA (on Saturday) with us, that’s powerful. That shows the character of Brad, and then obviously the players on the team and that organization.”
Temple led the way when it came to the shirts, but the original idea came from Kings player development coordinator Akachi Okugo.
“(Okugo) mentioned it…and I was like, ‘That’s great; you’re right,’” Temple said. “And then I talked to our people, and it went up the ramp and it went up to the NBA.”
In a season in which NBA players have been maximizing their platform, this is just the latest example of NBA activism.
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