Bo Kimble to give pregame talk to Fennville team that lost teammate

Mar 7, 2011, 5:44 PM EDT

When Fennville High (Mich.) reached out to Bo Kimble to ask if he would talk with their grieving team prior to tonight’s state playoff opener, it received some some surprising news. Kimble was already planning on attending the game. Because like few others, Bo Kimble knows what the Fennville community is going through.

On Thursday, Wes Leonard had just hit the winning shot in Fennville’s 57-55 victory over Bridgman to end their regular season at 20-0, when he collapsed during the on-court celebration. He was rushed to the hospital, where he died of cardiac arrest due to an enlarged heart. Kimble’s friend and Loyola Marymount teammate, Hank Gathers, died of a heart ailment during a 1990 conference tournament game.

“I didn’t get a chance to personally deal with my grief, other than shooting a left-handed free throw,” he told ESPN’s “First Take.”

Now, Kimble is part of a non-profit organization, 44 for Life, that seeks to make automatic external defibrillators widely available and increase awareness and education about heart disease and sudden cardiac arrest.

He said the foundation was already in conversations with Fennville’s athletic director when he let them know he was already planning to attend the game.

“This falls in line with one of the No. 1 missions of the foundation — AED placement, CPR training — but more importantly now, more important than ever, proper screening of all athletes for every sport,” Kimble said.

Kimble pointed out that many schools may shy away from screening athletes because the results could open them to litigation if something were to happen to a player. But, he said, “We have to get past that.”

It wasn’t until Saturday that Fennville decided to participate in the playoffs at all. They’ll take on Lawrence High in the first round of the district tournament tonight, in a game that was moved from Lawrence to Hope College in Holland to accommodate a larger crowd.

Kimble will talk with the Fennville players before the game, when he will tell them that he understands “100 percent what you’re going through.”