The Morning Journal (Lorain, OH)
HoopTech tips off with first sessions
North Ridgeville facility opens to public, featuring games, training and drills
After years of hard work, Dan McNamara’s dream has become a reality.
Following months of construction earlier this year, HoopTech, a 24,000-square foot facility located at Victory Park in North Ridgeville, finally opened to the public on Aug. 1.
“It’s a little surreal. You go two years with a vision in your mind of what it will look like, and you have a million ideas and probably only a fraction of those come to fruition,” McNamara said. “But overall I think it turned out well, maybe a bit over my expectations I think.
But I hope when people come in they like it as well.”
Festivities opened with several girls basketball games on the facilities’ main court, while other guests trained using video boards and hoops on the other side of the gym.
Trainers led guests through their free evaluations that included passing, dribbling and shooting drills. All using HoopTech and Shoot 360’s state-ofthe-art technology, which uses cameras to measure stats like the arc and entry angle of a shot.
Guests could also visit the in-house barber on the second floor, which was unfinished but will eventually house HoopTech’s parents and player lounges.
Masks were required for entry and upon entering the facility guests were met with temperature checks. After every training session, balls used were sanitized.
All of those protocols were a part of what HoopTech and Shoot 360 are calling their ‘Full court press’ on the novel coronavirus.
“We’ve had a plan in place where when one game finishes they leave and the new teams come in,” said McNamara. “If you look around, all of the chairs are distanced, everyone here has a mask. If it comes down for a second, we ask them to put it back up. We’re following what the guidelines are and hopefully one day we’ll have a lot more people in here.”
McNamara envisions HoopTech as a place where residents of North Ridgeville and its surrounding communities can come to have fun and improve themselves.
“It’s really for the community. For kids to have the opportunity to come in here and enjoy something like this,” he said. “I would have loved this as a kid to be a part of this and have everyday access to go in and get better and have fun doing it.”
Alongside Shoot 360, HoopTech has partnered with the Junior Cavs, a youth basketball league for children ages 3 to 14. The facility will also offer adult and youth leagues under its own branding as well in the future.
It’s first skills camp will take place Aug. 10 to Aug. 15, for children in first through eighth grade. Prospective campers can register at hooptech.com.
That course was the old Lorain County Club and is a part of Lorain history. That course is one of the first places that a lot of Lorain residents golf at, myself included.” — Spencer Roule, Lorain Historical Society Board of Trustees member