Shaw sixth-graders honored for Math Hoops win

A banner now hangs at Shaw Avenue School bearing the names Karina Ramnauth and Anjali Edmonds, the champions of the New York City NBA Math Hoops Tournament at the Barclay’s Center in Brooklyn on March 24.
The banner was presented to the two sixth-graders at a Valley Stream District 30 Board of Education meeting on April 23. “As they do in arenas when you win a championship, they unveil banners and they hang it from the rafters,” Shaw Avenue Principal Alejandro Rivera said before he showed off the banner. “So we can’t hang things from the rafters just because our ceilings are a little too low, but we are going to unveil another banner for Shaw Avenue.”
The banner now hangs next to a banner from last year’s math hoops competition, when Athena Pajotte and Priya Manga won. “We were really proud of ourselves because it was announced in front of everyone,” Ramnauth said.
Ramnauth and Edmonds also received trophies for winning the tournament at the last minute. “In the last 10 seconds we were actually down one point,” Edmonds said, adding that after they scored the two girls stalled to prevent their opponents from shooting.
Ramnauth also said that the competition against teams from Nassau County and New York City was “intense,” and that she did not expect to win. “We had a lot more expectation on us because our school won last year and we kind of had this expectation that we had to win,” she said.

NBA Math Hoops is a basketball board game that incorporates statistics. As part of the game, each team chooses and drafts players from the National Basketball Association and the Women’s National Basketball Association. Each player’s card has a photo with a pie chart and grid on the back that gives of the player’s statistics. Each contestant then rolls dice and adds, subtracts, multiplies or divides the numbers to match one of the numbers on the board, which is designed as a basketball court; then contestants choose which of their players would be best equipped to make a shot from that location. They then spin a spinner on top of the pie and hope that the pointer lands in their score zone. However, if an opposing team member calls a foul, then the player has to roll two dice and follow an x- and y- axis to see if it would be in the score zone.
“It’s focusing a lot on decimals, percentages, statistics and strategy,” said Rivera.
District 30 was also represented at the competition by students from Clear Stream Avenue and Forest Road schools. Under the guidance of their math coach Timothy Rau, Clear Stream participants included Brian Abraham, Cameron Charles, Tolu Diyaolu, Saige Frisco, Sasha Jaikaran and Michael Sukhu. Math coach Christopher Onorato worked with Forest Road participants Jonathan Beltre-Rojas, Shaila Fretel, Justin James, Iman Khan, Emily Persaud and Arshbir Singh.
According to Rivera, the winning team could not have succeeded without the support of Mr. Canle, classroom teachers, fellow district administrators, Superintendent of Schools Dr. Nicholas Stirling and the Board of Education.