A new entry in the Women’s Bracket is on a basketball and healing mission.

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Guthrie does not extend back to those 29 years, but he was on the winning eighth-grade Metlakatla team that won the middle school tournament in 2001.

“That was fun, and then they stopped doing that,” he said. “It’s a lot of fun being here. The best part is meeting up with all the guys you battled with in high school or down in village tournaments and stuff.”

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Hooper Bay defeated Angoon 77-17 in their first trip country wise email marketing list to Southeast.

For a first-time team formed as a healing act, the women’s team from Hooper Bay proved it is very healthy indeed in its debut game Sunday with a 77-17 victory over Angoon that was as dominant throughout as the score indicates.

Florence Kargi said she began efforts to form the team in January, after an effort by her to join a Yakutat team last year was thwarted by the tournament’s residency rules. But adding an element of solidarity was the lingering impact of two 18-year-old women found stabbed to death in a home in the Western Alaska village last Oct. 1. A 20-year-old man from the village was arrested a week later on suspicion of the murders.

Hooper Bay’s Susie Long takes a jump shot against Angoon during a women’s bracket game at the 76th Juneau Lions Club Gold Medal Basketball Tournament on Sunday, March 23, at Juneau-Douglas High School: Yadaa.at Kalé. (Mark Sabbatini / Juneau Empire)
Hooper Bay’s Susie Long takes a jump shot against Angoon during a women’s bracket game at the 76th Juneau Lions Club Gold Medal Basketball Tournament on Sunday, March 23, at Juneau-Douglas High School: Yadaa.at Kalé. (Mark Sabbatini / Juneau Empire)

“It’s more to them than basketball,” Kargi said of the team’s formation and participation in Gold Medal. “It’s more like a healing trip just to tell them life happens. It goes on, you know. You can breathe.”