Granite City Sports Hosts 2nd Annual Holiday Tournament [VIDEO]

SARTELL-- A bunch of youngsters have the chance to play basketball in a local tournament this weekend. The 2nd annual Granite City Sports Holiday Tournament is being held in Sartell and St. Cloud on Saturday and Sunday.

Seventy teams made up of boy’s basketball players in grades four through eight are participating in the event. Many of the teams are local, but many come from other parts of the state such as the Twin Cities, Brainerd, and Alexandria.

Tournament director Jay Caldwell says events like this are good for the greater St. Cloud community.

St. Cloud actually does another one, the SCAYBA tournament, in February. So all of that brings people to the community. They’re spending money on hotels and restaurants and going shopping between games.

Caldwell has been involved with the St. Cloud Area Youth Basketball Association for six years and also coached his sons. He says putting it all together is a group effort.

We have a couple of organizations, Apollo football and Apollo girl’s basketball, that do scoreboards for us. We work with the S.C.A.R. Dolls who helped out with admissions. So there’s a lot of different individuals and organizations that are a part of this.

The tournament is non-elimination with each team guaranteed three games. Half of the teams, those with the best overall records, will receive trophies at the end of the competition.

The games are being held Saturday and Sunday at the Sartell Community Center and Whitney Recreational Center, and anyone can attend.