Fun, Loud and Clear : Selaco’s Hearing-Impaired Players Enjoy Competing in L.A. Watts Summer Games

Jim Watts, Downey Selaco High basketball coach, paced nervously. He yelled. He pleaded. And with a pained look, he glanced at the scoreboard.

Such are the actions of a coach whose team is trailing by 50 points, whose players are undersized and overmatched.

Thing was, most of Watts’ team couldn’t hear his booming voice anyway . . . so he yelled and used sign language.

“I don’t care if they can’t hear me,” Watts said with a polite smile after Selaco, a school for the hearing-impaired, lost to Wilmington Banning, 76-18, Sunday in the 26th annual L.A. Watts Summer Games. “I feel like I’m contributing something.”

In the aftermath of the defeat at Compton College, Watts remained upbeat and jovial as his players gathered around him on the bleachers.

“This (was) very exciting, especially for (the players), because normally we don’t play against hearing teams,” Watts said.

Selaco, whose players communicate mostly through sign language, had never won at the Watts Games until Saturday, when the Seahawks defeated Middle College High, 66-60.

“We’re very excited about coming, this being our second year here,” said 6-foot-5 center Sam Thomas, one of two Selaco players taller than 6 feet. “And we’re really excited that we won. Probably all the hearing-impaired people feel proud of us and everything.”

It was an improbable victory, considering the state of the Selaco basketball program, which actually isn’t a program at all.

The school, located on the campus of Downey High, has no sports budget, no gym to call home and only 50 students.

The team gathers once a week for practice, on Saturdays.

It once had a game canceled because a Downey freshmen team needed to practice.

“Basically, I just do it for them,” said Watts, a teacher at Selaco for 15 years. “I do it because it gives these guys something to do. It gives them some motivation. It gives them some self-esteem. It keeps them out of gangs, (and) it keeps them out of drugs.

“The biggest problem with the deaf kids is their self-esteem. So this is tremendous--especially when they can beat a hearing team.”

A few of the Selaco players, such as Thomas, were talented enough to play on the Downey team, but remained with the Seahawks, Watts said.

“It’s also a cultural thing,” he said. “You have to remember, deaf culture and deaf pride. Even though they were on the Downey High School campus, these kids feel much more of an affinity with their own deaf school.”

L.A. Watts Games organizers wanted to include other such schools and offer competitive events for the physically challenged, such as wheelchair basketball, but plans fell through.

Nevertheless, Selaco’s inclusion seems to embody the Games’ goals: to include teams and players from diverse backgrounds and perspectives, furthering the theme of “Building Bridges of Understanding.”

Said Watts: “They were here, they competed, they had fun.”