{"id":350930,"date":"2023-12-02T02:00:44","date_gmt":"2023-12-02T03:00:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=350930"},"modified":"2023-12-02T04:00:42","modified_gmt":"2023-12-02T04:00:42","slug":"7th-grader-hits-buzzer-beater-on-what-would-have-been-the-birthday-of-his-late-friend","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=350930","title":{"rendered":"7th grader hits buzzer beater on what would have been the birthday of his late friend"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Zy Neal certainly knows how to deliver, fulfilling a pre-game promise made to honor the birthday of one of his schoolmates who had passed away this fall. The seventh grader delivered the game-winning bucket from mid-court in an emotional win for Neal and his team.<\/p>\n<p>Neal, who attends Greenville Middle School (Greeneville, Tennessee), sunk this tremendous SportsCenter Top 10 worthy game-winner. It was an impressive shot for sure, But adding even more insight into the story, the winner came on what would have been the birthday of his late friend, Kaden Gunter.<\/p>\n<p>Neal had promised before the game that he was going to step up with a big performance to honor his friend.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-media-max-width=\"560\">\n<p dir=\"ltr\" lang=\"en\"><a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/SportsCenter?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">@SportsCenter<\/a> Zy Neal (7th grader at GMS in Greeneville, TN) with the dagger at the buzzer for the win! He said that he was going to have a big night for Kaden, and boy was he right! What an amazing moment on his recently passed friend&#8217;s 1st heavenly birthday. <img src=\"https:\/\/s.w.org\/images\/core\/emoji\/14.0.0\/72x72\/1f64f.png\" alt=\"\ud83d\ude4f\" class=\"wp-smiley\" style=\"height: 1em;max-height: 1em\" \/><img src=\"https:\/\/s.w.org\/images\/core\/emoji\/14.0.0\/72x72\/1f525.png\" alt=\"\ud83d\udd25\" class=\"wp-smiley\" style=\"height: 1em;max-height: 1em\" \/><img src=\"https:\/\/s.w.org\/images\/core\/emoji\/14.0.0\/72x72\/1f3c0.png\" alt=\"\ud83c\udfc0\" class=\"wp-smiley\" style=\"height: 1em;max-height: 1em\" \/> <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/SCTop10?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">#SCTop10<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/EOGwHohH7B\">pic.twitter.com\/EOGwHohH7B<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Matt Quillen (@doubledeuce22Q) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/doubledeuce22Q\/status\/1730646062598140064?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">December 1, 2023<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">The story of Gunter,\u00a0<\/span><a class=\"editor-rtfLink\" href=\"https:\/\/www.greenevillesun.com\/news\/local_news\/greeneville-middle-student-kaden-gunter-dies-after-cardiac-emergency\/article_148c2024-59b3-11ee-94f7-63cbc3addc84.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">a 12-year-old who passed away while participating in middle school football practice<\/span><\/a><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">, made national headlines this September. That his life could be honored in such a unique way, given his love for sports, seemed fitting.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">Even the celebration from Neal, enthusiastic for sure, seemed a bit of an emotional release on what must have been a difficult day for many in the school.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<div class=\"mh-excerpt\"><p>Middle schooler hits halfcourt, game-winning shot to honor his recently passed friend.<\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":286601,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/350930"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=350930"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/350930\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":350932,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/350930\/revisions\/350932"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/286601"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=350930"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=350930"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=350930"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}