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Basketball is Back at Farber

from DJN March 3, 2022

by The Detroit Jewish News

from DJN March 3, 2022, page 54

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OUR COMMUNITY

FARBER HEBREW DAY SCHOOL

Here’s the Farber Hebrew Day School basketball team that will compete in the fourth annual David Tanzman Memorial Tournament.

Basketball is Back at Farber

Jewish day school hosts fourth annual David Tanzman Memorial Tournament.

STEVE STEIN CONTRIBUTING WRITER

They’ll be coming from Atlanta, Cleveland, Columbus, Ohio, Denver and Pittsburgh to play basketball this week at Farber Hebrew Day School in Southfield.

Five high school teams from small Jewish day schools like Farber will join the host team at the fourth annual David Tanzman Memorial Tournament.

The Thursday through Sunday (March 3-6) tournament is another sign of life slowly getting back to normal two years after the start of a worldwide pandemic.

The tournament wasn’t held last year because of COVID-19 mitigations. There wasn’t even a Farber basketball team last year.

Thankfully, basketballs will be bouncing and shots will be swishing this week at Farber. And lives will be changed.

“While basketball is a ‘good excuse’ for everyone to get together, our tournament isn’t just about basketball,” said Josh Levisohn, Farber’s head of school.

“The players get re-acquainted with friends and meet new friends. They have a chance to broaden their horizons in a positive environment. And they spend Shabbos together.”

The tournament is named in honor of one of Farber’s founders. The school opened as Akiva Hebrew Day School in 1964.

After David Tanzman’s death in 2016, Farber high school students created the tournament as a way to demonstrate his love for basketball and devotion to Jewish day schools.

Organizing and running the tournament is truly a community effort.

Farber high school students, including the entire basketball team, do much of the heavy lifting with guidance from school administrators and staff members.

About half of Farber’s 60 high school students have helped put together the tour-

ADLER FAMILY SELESNY FAMILY

Aaron Adler Ari Selesny

nament this year.

Close friends Aaron Adler and Avi Selesny of Southfield are this year’s tournament co-commissioners. Each plays on the Farber basketball team.

Being friends has been a big help for the co-commissioners.

“Aaron and I see each other a lot, so we’ve been able to talk a lot about the tournament,” Selesny said. “Because we’re friends, we can say something is a good idea or bad idea to each other. We work together.”

Adler, a senior, was in charge of the tournament booklet and helped with fundraising when he was a sophomore.

Selesny is a junior. He was one of the tournament game public address announcers when he was a freshman.

It hasn’t been easy to restart the tournament amidst ever-changing COVID-19 mandates and mitigations and a pandemic that drags on.

Planning for the tournament began in December, later than usual.

“Arranging for housing for the visiting players and coaches has been a big challenge because of COVID,” Selesny said. “Some families aren’t comfortable these days having visitors stay with them.”

Adler said, “We’ve had to remember how things were done in the past and do those things the same way, only better.”

Also on the Farber basketball team besides Adler and Selesny are Ari Schon, Jonathan Kornblum, Joey Goldman, Yishai Hyman, Yisrael Attali, Joseph Winer, Yona Benjamin, Ziv Digadker, Micah Adler and Benji Gardin.

Jason Hollis is the team’s coach. Joel Lewis II is the assistant coach.

All six teams in the tournament represent a high school with less than 100 students. Each of the visiting teams previously played in the tournament.

Joining Farber in the tournament field this week are two-time defending champion Fuchs-Mizrachi School from Cleveland, Atlanta Jewish Academy, Columbus Torah Academy, Denver Academy of Torah and Hillel Academy of Pittsburgh.

The tournament schedule is posted on the Farber and tournament Facebook pages.

Each team will play three games before the playoffs Sunday. The tournament championship game will be at 1:15 p.m.

Thanks to tournament sponsors, admission to games is free. Masks are required for all spectators.

For those who can’t make it to Farber for the tournament or have concerns about being in a crowd, games will be livestreamed on the tournament’s YouTube channel.

Farber is at 21100 W. 12 Mile Road.