High School Cheers as Blind Basketball Player Makes Free Throw

Published: January 25, 2024

High School Cheers as Blind Basketball Player Makes Free Throw

By Movieguide® Contributor

A blind high school basketball player inspired her school after making a free throw during a game.

In 2022, Jules Hoogland, a student at Zeeland East High School in Michigan, attempted a free throw during her team’s face-off against Zeeland West High School.

The video shows a packed gym as Hoogland, who is part of the Unified Sports Program for special education students, is escorted up to the free throw line by teammate and friend Ally Guffey.

“She’s my eyes on the court because I don’t have my cane side to put my trust in here to make sure she doesn’t let me get hit by balls, and she guides me in the right direction,” Hoogland told FOX 17 about Guffey.

“I had never met anyone who was blind before. So I knew nothing. She put a lot of trust in me,” Guffey added. “And it just…we had a lot of trial and error. But we have come very, very far. And now we’re in a class together for the past two years.”

The gym went silent as someone tapped the bottom of the backboard so Hoogland could locate the rim.

After multiple taps, she shot the ball and “scored her final free throw of the season in front of a crowd of approximately 2,500 people,” per CBS Sports.

The gym erupted in excitement as students cheered for their teammate and classmate.

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“I was really nervous because all these people are staring at me,” the teen recalled. “Luckily, I couldn’t see them staring at me.”

“I was like, ‘Yes, I made it!’” she added. “That was the only thing I could think of, I was just really excited. I was honestly really proud of myself.”

The Unified Sports Program for special education students was formed a few years prior in an effort to bring teenagers together and give those with special needs a chance to compete in sports.

Unified Coach Jesse Steel expressed, “To watch the culture shift of our school community really made a difference. And just to be able to watch how that’s continued to grow. Students be accepted, students be shown that they matter and given a chance to really to prove that to the school body.”

Unified Coach Nate Vande Guchte added, “I think it’s humbling when you realize that those goals are reality and that those are the relationships that now exist on our campus in our community.”