Kirko Bangz, Wichita talent on display in Saturday charity basketball game

A collection of Wichita’s top basketball talent will be on display on Saturday night in a charity basketball game organized by the local clothing brand Not Human.

The game will be held at the Boys and Girls Club, at 2400 N. Opportunity Dr., with events beginning at 6 p.m. Outside of the venue, there will be food trucks and pop-up shops from local businesses. Inside, on top of the basketball game, there will a live DJ, three-point contest, and dunk contest. The special guest of the evening will be rapper Kirko Bangz, who will play in the game.

Tickets are $10 with all proceeds from the back-to-school drive being donated to the local youth to help with clothing, supplies, and snacks. A GoFundMe account set up for the event has already raised over $1,500.

“What people are going to get out of this is a great basketball game, a fun night out, and they’re getting to donate to something meaningful,” said Tevin Jacques, the creator of Not Human who helped organize the event. “We’re going to have a lot of stuff going on that night and people who come out are going to have a fun time. We want to entertain people.”

Late last year, Jacques joined business partners Cory Barnes and Hayden Harris to open Space Station downtown.

Jacques said the company has surpassed his own expectations not even a year in and he credits the success to the support from Wichita. Not Human sells a wide array of urban street-wear clothing, but its top seller to date remains its “Wichita Made” shirts.

“A lot of our success is due to people here in Wichita,” Barnes said. “We’re always looking for ways to give back to the community and we thought this basketball game would be a good idea. Wichita has helped us, so now we want to help the future of Wichita.”

If the basketball game was going to be successful, Jacques and Barnes knew they were going to have to attract Wichita’s top talent.

The rosters feature a wide array of talent from different eras of City League basketball and players with Wichita ties. There are recent high school graduates, like Samajae Haynes-Jones and Jerrick Harding, recent college graduates, like Joe Mitchell, Jawanza Poland, and the twins, Briston and Brison White, and then former professional athletes, like WSU great Jamar Howard and NFL player Elbert Mack.

Throw in Kirko Bangz, who Jacques recruited from his connections in the rap industry. Jacques said he has sent his apparel to such acts as Wiz Khalifa, Wale, Ty Dolla Sign, and Trey Songz. He even had recruited Wayne Selden to play in the game, but a knee injury prevented Selden from attending after he signed a contract with the Memphis Grizzlies this summer.

“I just made a list of the biggest basketball names in Wichita and I just started getting these guys,” Jacques said. “Basketball is a game that everyone can go play at the Y. You can’t do that with football or baseball. But with basketball, people love to watch and we’ve got some pretty good players coming.”

Saturday’s basketball game is just the beginning, Jacques hopes. He has always been involved with volunteer work and he says his motivation for organizing charity drives is the feeling of knowing he helped people in need.

Although he wants to keep his roots in Wichita, Jacques and the Not Human brand has plans for expanding. Until then, they want to give back to their most loyal fan base: the people of Wichita.

“I love Wichita and I love putting on for my city, but I’ve got that ambition and I want to expand this as far as I can take it,” Jacques said. “Right now we have sales in 42 states and we have our website. The dream is to grow this everywhere and to average 100 online sales a day. For now, that’s the goal and that’s the dream.”

This story was originally published August 12, 2016 at 3:00 PM with the headline "Kirko Bangz, Wichita talent on display in Saturday charity basketball game."