Hoops star laid to rest
Name Harlem street for slain student, Sharpton sez
Basketball images and relics dominated the funeral of a local college basketball star on Monday, but it was guns and violence on the minds of most mourners.
Days after a Harlem hoops player was gunned down at a local rapper’s Father’s Day cookout, friends, family and teammates crowded a Manhattan church filled with images of Darius Lee shooting jumpers and grabbing rebounds.
Even Lee’s open casket held an image of him playing basketball, as did the white T-shirts worn by many grieving friends.
Lee, who was playing on a basketball scholarship at Houston Baptist University in Texas, was home on summer break when gunfire erupted early June 20 at a Harlem River Park cookout.
Cops said Lee was caught in a crossfire between rival gangs, whose gunfight also wounded eight other partygoers.
Lee had been a standout at St. Raymond’s High School in the Bronx. And he had been named the Texas school’s male athlete of the year.
“When summer came, as much as he loved basketball, he’d always want to go home and spend time with his family,” said Tristan Moore, one of Lee’s Houston teammates who filed past Lee’s coffin at Harlem’s First
Corinthian Baptist Church. “He wasn’t out to go out and be in trouble.”
“Everything he was about was basketball,” said Aliyah Jefferson, 16, Lee’s cousin. “Nothing else but basketball. He was a very good person.”
Aliyah lamented the gun violence plaguing New York City, and even chided the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent decision that would make it easier for New Yorkers to carry concealed weapons.
“I feel like they should do more,” Aliyah said. “Why would you do that at this moment? Honestly, it’s getting worse.”
The Rev. Al Sharpton, who delivered Lee’s eulogy, called for a street to be named in the Harlem man’s honor. “He was who we tell our children to be,” Sharpton said.
Not even the personal stories of Lee’s hard work or his love of the game was enough to distract cousins and coaches from the violence that took his life.
Mourners had to file past metal detectors to enter the church, and uniformed police officers manned each corner of the block and across the street.
“He had so much more to do,” said Philip McKenzie, a former teammate.
“One of the smartest basketball IQs I’ve ever seen. Darius would go from practice to watch games, then play 2K. All basketball. After losses he took it personally every time.”