A player collapsed after the first quarter of Saturday night’s streetball exhibition game at Monticello High School and was rushed to an area hospital.
Martell Brooks appeared to collapse with a seizure and then go into cardiac arrest, said Sgt. S. Cox of the Albemarle County Police Department.
After Brooks collapsed, a county police officer alerted personnel from Monticello Fire and Rescue, who rushed Brooks to the University of Virginia Medical Center.
No information on his condition was available Saturday night.
After Brooks’ collapse, the crowd was briefly ushered from the gymnasium before being allowed to return for the rest of the show.
Brooks, whose MySpace page lists him as 20 years old, was taking part in the New Legends of Streetball Celebrity Basketball Game to Fight Heart Disease.
Brooks was playing for Black Stars, a team of local basketball players who were providing opposition to the New Legends of Streetball, a corporate-sponsored group that travels the country putting on exhibition games of streetball, which is flashy, pickup-style basketball.
“He’s just an all-around great guy,” said Taquan Wicks, 15, of Charlottesville. “I’m sad that this happened to him, and he’s going to be in my prayers.”
Wick’s dance group, Moon Men, dedicated its performance Saturday night to Brooks when the show resumed.
Before the performance, Quinton Harrell of EcoDry Cleaners, which sponsored the event, asked the crowd to signal with applause whether it wanted the show to continue.
The crowd applauded.
“We pray hard for Martell from the heart and from the soul,” Harrell said. “His purpose tonight was to entertain you all and we made the decision to continue to entertain you all.”
Also before the dance exhibition, Wicks spoke a few words and a man from the audience led the crowd, hands linked, in the Lord’s Prayer. Moon Men then performed, and the game resumed.
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