So.Gay is the Official Media Partner of the New York City Pride Basketball League, Men’s+ Division. In the first of its kind partnership, So.Gay and NYCPBL partner to amplify the critical community organization and create new Sports content for the LGBTQ+ community. You can read more about the partnership here.
Many gay men grow up believing we have to sacrifice parts of our lives and who we are just to have a chance at happiness. It’s what keeps so many of us in the closet—the fear that our identity will be diluted by who we sleep with, relegating the remaining pieces of ourselves to exile. We worry it will limit the spaces we’re allowed to occupy and the shoulders we can lean on.
Although LGBTQ+ Olympians and professional athletes continue to break records and shatter glass ceilings, many promising young gay athletes abandon their talents and dreams simply because they’re brave enough to trust those around them with their truth.
Take Peter Catchings, who told So.Gay that his college basketball coach asked him to quit the team after he came out. Or Aaron Westbrook, who said straight basketball stopped doing it for him after arriving in NYC and craving a sense of belonging with his passion.
Both gay basketball players found a home at Pride Basketball League NYC.
A league of LGBTQ+ basketball players with different divisions based on talent and experience might strike some as an underground community in Manhattan, but it’s been around since 2006, so catch up, babe—and join!
Gayness and basketball aren’t realms typically associated with each other in society or pop culture. But if you ask the Pride Basketball League NYC players, that’s only because the sports zeitgeist hasn’t yet reached the inclusivity of their courts.
The league represents more than dribbling and scoring hoops under the rainbow. It’s returning to some players the liberation and joy it once stole from them, the ability to champion all their identities simultaneously.
Patrick Leonard tells So.Gay that he played basketball his entire life until his identity put him at a crossroads. “I felt like these environments were hyper-masculine and tended to breed a lot of homophobia,” Leonard says. “This forced me to stay in the closet longer than I would have otherwise because I was so dedicated to playing basketball.”
Although he was used to standing out—whether it was attending a predominantly white school in Colorado or living abroad in South Korea—he says it never bothered him because people were accepting of his Blackness. His gayness, however, posed a bigger threat in sports.
“Growing up Black, I think that’s an identity that can be tough to understand at first,” says Leonard. “But once you get comfortable with it, you can have fun with it, meet amazing people, and feel at home in your own skin.”
Though he didn’t return to basketball in college, he would soon discover the same truth applied for his gayness after joining Pride Basketball League NYC. Being a gay Black basketball player wasn’t like finding a needle in a haystack. They just needed a space to connect and a court to play on.
Pride Basketball League NYC welcomes more than just lifelong players. The connection between identity and sports isn’t built on talent alone. It’s built on the desire to play without holding back, to find a team you’d embrace as friends.
Jacob Simmons tells So.Gay while some of his favorite childhood memories may have revolved around basketball, he’d only rate himself as ok to a decent recreational player.
“I’m so fortunate to be an openly gay man in one of the biggest queer metropolitan areas in the country, which has made the league less a place to escape my sexuality but more so a space to embrace it alongside all of the friends I’ve made in the league,” he says.
He says basketball used to be a constant in his life, and now, thanks to the league, so is the LGBTQ+ community.
For Nikko Marata, it, too, became so much more than about sports. “I’ve made new besties from the league that I see often,” he says. “Thinking back to my first year, shoutout to the captains who make all the newbies feel safe and welcome; it really makes a difference.”
For him, the league is about not hiding any part of who you are. “Everyone is supportive, and there’s a real sense of belonging that you don’t always find in regular leagues,” he says.
Ultimately, the relationship between sports and identity isn’t something you feel like your sexuality or see like the color of your skin. But for many gays, the love of basketball was innate from the moment they gripped the ball and took their first shot—first at the hoop, and then with a league that celebrated who they were.
So.Gay is the Official Media Partner of the New York City Pride Basketball League, Men’s+ Division. In the first of its kind partnership, So.Gay and NYCPBL partner to amplify the critical community organization and create new Sports content for the LGBTQ+ community. You can read more about the partnership here.
