Fans cheer on three Minnesotans in Paralympic wheelchair basketball semifinals

The U.S. women’s wheelchair basketball team is heading to the Paralympic gold medal match, after their close win against China in Friday’s semifinal, 50-47. 

At a restaurant in St. Louis Park, a few dozen fans sat on the edge of their seats. The crowd cheered late in the fourth quarter when Minnesotan Rose Hollermann netted a shot to widen the U.S. lead to five points. 

Sharon Van Winkel kept a close eye on Hollermann’s plays. Van Winkel was one of Hollermann’s first wheelchair basketball coaches, when Hollermann started playing more than 20 years ago. 

“Thank you, Rose!” Van Winkel cheered as Hollermann scored. “When I would coach and the kids would make a basket, I would always yell, “Thank you!’”

Van Winkel repeated her cheer many times during Friday’s game — Hollermann led the U.S. with 20 points. 

Three of the U.S. women’s wheelchair basketball team members hail from Minnesota: Hollermann, Josie Aslakson from Jordan and Abby Bauleke from Savage. The three played together at the Courage Kenny Rehabilitation Institute, which runs a recreation program for adaptive sports.

It’s where Van Winkel coached for several years, after her own career as a wheelchair basketball player. She competed in the 1980 and 1984 Paralympics. 

She remembers coaching Hollermann as a 6-year-old who was excited to try basketball. 

“Rose was an athlete from the age of 6. Maybe her enthusiasm drove her to be a good athlete,” Van Winkel said. “You could see the way she would move in her chair and how she could pick up cues on the basketball court.” 

Courage Kenny staff and volunteers organized the watch party to cheer on their three former athletes. Despite the stress of the close match, attendees said it’s not all about the medals. For many, the viewing party was also a celebration of adaptive sports, and the strong Minnesota community around it. 

Van Winkel said wheelchair basketball was a turning point for her. After she became disabled from an injury in her early 20s, she was fired from her job. Sports gave her a chance to meet others with similar disabilities and see them building exciting, successful lives. 

“This changes lives,” Van Winkel said. “A family will come in with their kid for a program, and they're worried about how their kid is going to live their life and what's going to happen to them, and a magic piece happens to every one of those families where now there's hope.”

Patty Gordon came to watch the game. Her son participated in several sports at Courage Kenny and went on to play wheelchair basketball at the University of Alabama. She said sports helped him make connections with other kids when he was young.

“He can be a competitor just like his friends and talk about basketball and how he did and about the tournaments he went to,” Gordon said. 

Megan Welty is a sports specialist at Courage Kenny. She’s noticed a growing visibility of adaptive sports. She sees more Paralympians featured in Olympic television commercials and more clips of the Paralympic games circling on social media. 

“I think what’s so cool too is just the Paralympic movement, of how these Paralympic athletes are being recognized for their achievements,” Welty said. “They really are incredible elite athletes.” 

That impacts programs back home, she said. She hears from more and more parents of disabled kids who want to learn about trying adaptive sports. 

Fans breathed a sigh of relief at the end of the game and gave another round of cheers as the game livestream broadcast a clip of their watch party to viewers.

Many said they’ll be up early to watch the gold medal match on Sunday, which tips off at 6:45 a.m. CST. The U.S. will face the winner of Friday afternoon’s Netherlands-Canada semifinal game.

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