Inaugural Battle of the Border Basketball Tournament breaks ground

Yuma Catholic and head coach Thurman Schaetzle achieved their goal of hosting a local basketball tournament

YUMA, Ariz. (KYMA) - The first edition of the Battle of the Border Basketball Tournament kicked of today at Yuma Catholic, and it has been a success right off the bat.

For any project to take off, it needs to start off as an idea or stem from an experience.

That's exactly what happened for Yuma Catholic and Shamrock's Basketball Head Coach Thurman Schaetzle.

"We got to go to two tournaments, and I went back to our administration after one of them and said 'I think we can bring a basketball tournament here to Yuma'," Schaetzle said. "I heard about the ones in the past and the quality of them and our goal was to bring one back and and even raise the bar in its quality."

And the first day of the tournament did just that.

Eight teams are featured in the first year of the tournament, with six of them playing throughout the day on Thursday, there was plenty of basketball action on the first day of the new year.

Two of the teams are former state champions. The Gregory School has won back-to-back 1A State Championships while Pusch Ridge is the defending 3A champion.

"You want to play against them and beat them and to have them come to Yuma Catholic where we want to establish a basketball level in our program on a consistent basis year-in, year-out, this is where I want it to happen," Schaetzle said.

And the goal is to have the tournament happen for years to come.

"The long term is to just keep expanding, we're about three hours, 3.5 hours is the furthest team," Schaetzle said. "I think if we can continue to build it and deliver just an experience with great hospitality, I think we can can expand it to teams maybe about five, 5.5 hours."

To learn more about the inaugural tournament, and how it started successfully, watch the full story above.